There’s been a great interest in Geo and Geo Web technologies in recent years.

This is of course to some extent due to the competition between online map service providers like Google Maps and Microsoft’s Live Maps. Africa has not been left behind.

In 2009, April the first WhereCampAfrica (a ‘barcamp’ for geo people) was held in Nairobi, Kenya. Later on WhereCampAfrica moved to Kampala and this year WhereCampAfrica will be held in Bamako, Mali (check the event calendar for date and details). Furthermore, right here on Afrinnovator we covered the Map Kibera project that was driven by OpenStreetMaps (OSM) people in an effort to map the previously, largely, unmapped, Kibera slums.

When Google set up their first office in Africa, in Nairobi, Kenya; it became evident from the outstart that one of their top goals was to map Africa extensively. In a few short months the previously scanty map of Nairobi went from just one street across the whole map to a very detailed map of streets, buildings and many other points of interest.

Around the same time WhereCampAfrica Nairobi was held, Google went on to launch Google MapMaker in Kenya. A service that let ordinary people or people with specialized knowledge to create their own maps and Google could add this data onto Google Maps. Google Map Make gave more wings to the Google Geo team in Kenya, with lots of new data being added to maps pretty fast. Check out this short time-lapse video of mapping activity in the Eldoret area:

Few of the other mapping services have been quite as aggressive as Google in terms of mapping Africa.

So clearly geo and geo-web technologies have come a long way in Africa and are still being pushed by quite a strong mapping community. We caught up with Mark de Blois, who was previously with the Google Geo team in Nairobi (he later on started a geo consulting firm called Upande.com, he’ll tell us about that too) to discuss this:

Afrinnovator.com: Tell us a bit about yourself

Mark (Upande.com): My name is Mark de Blois, I am a 37 year old Dutchman happily married to Jody and we have been blessed with 2 great kids, a boy and a girl. We moved to Kenya about 2 years ago, though I spent 13 years of my youth in this beautiful country. Obviously that was a great experience as I brought my family back to Kenya also!

In the past half year I have been busy setting up Upande.com, a consulting firm providing services in the geo field. Currently I am providing services to research institutes, UN organisations and African Union, among others.

Afrinnovator.com: How did you get involved in geo? Where did the passion come from?

Mark (Upande.com): I got involved in geo through my Biology study, which I got into based on my fascination with African wildlife. I did my Masters in Landscape Ecology at Wageningen Agricultural University, Netherlands, where I specialized in Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and Remote Sensing, particularly in relation to vegetation studies. I have always had a fascination for maps which I have been collecting for the last ten years. I also have a broad interest generally speaking and needless to say geo applies to almost all fields so I have got lots of ideas I am keen to develop.

Afrinnovator.com: Tell us a bit about your experience in the mapping/geo area. You’ve worked with Google as a Geo specialist right…?

Mark (Upande.com): I have worked as a GIS specialist for over 12 years. Having started in the Netherlands providing consulting services and GIS training to largely government organisations, I moved into Corporate Social Responsibility mapping for a UK based firm. But my ‘African roots’ kept playing up meaning I started looking into opportunities to apply and share my experiences in Africa.

This brought me to Google Kenya where I worked as the Geo Lead until last June and was part of a really great team. I was in charge of all kinds of geo related work in Africa which was very exciting, innovative and groundbreaking in many ways. Despite this unique opportunity I felt that setting up my own company would give me more flexibility in various ways.

Afrinnovator.com: How about your interest in Africa? Tell us how that came about.

Mark (Upande.com): My interest in Africa obviously stems from my youth. I think a huge percentage of people who grew up in Africa come back at some point in time, they catch a virus of some sort which drives them back . Other than feeling ‘more at home’ here than back in the Netherlands, there are tonnes of opportunities as well which can really positively impact society which I’d like to try and make a small contribution to. So the market is more exciting than in the West in many ways. There are huge opportunities to make money too, though that is not my drive to be honest.

Afrinnovator.com: The state of geo/mapping technology in Africa – tell us where you see Africa at present and where you see Africa moving to in terms of this technology

Mark (Upande.com): On the state of geo/mapping in Africa, times are changing really quickly. Whereas GIS has been around for quite some time including huge datasets, this technology and their potential is still often restricted to experts not keen on sharing their information. A disease known as DBHD is quite prevalent (@HansRosling: Database Hugging Disorder), which isn’t all that different from some Western countries by the way. Crowd sourcing of data either through online tracing of satellite imagery, field collection with handheld GPS units, GPS enabled handsets or even simple mobile phones is really taking off.

This will increasingly mean that official sources of data will be bypassed if they are not made available in a quick, easy and cheap format. This will put pressure on these entities to open up and engage if they don’t want to be sidelined by many users. And that is a great thing which will ultimately benefit many end users.

Afrinnovator.com: There is an interesting convergence that has been happening in recent years between the web and geo. Talk to us a bit about that. What new capabilities/potentials lie in this?

Mark (Upande.com): There has indeed been an interesting convergence between the web and geo in recent years. Through webmapping technology largely inspired by Open Source solutions such as MapServer, traditional GIS data has been made much more accessible to potentially millions through the web. These innovative tools have inspired the proprietary GIS companies to follow suite, keen to take a share of the pie and to keep licensing revenues coming in.

With commercial companies such as Yahoo, Microsoft and Google all adding mapping applications to their product list, increasingly users of map related data no longer have to worry about getting their own copy of the base map but rather can focus on integrating existing freely available basemaps with their own content and functionality.

As 80% of the information we deal with on a daily basis has a spatial component, it is no wonder that geo and the web have really taken off. For Africa the web is very much related to mobile phones. Increasingly mobiles have GPS chips or can triangulate their position, so the geoweb is really becoming a personal reality.

Afrinnovator.com: How about with the ‘social web’. Can we expect more services that are driven by both ‘social’ and ‘geo’ aspects

Mark (Upande.com): Given the geoweb potentially available on your phone, social media will really start taking advantage of this the coming year. Google Latitude already allows you to see where your friends are, Google Buzz goes even further and allows you to share posts, pictures with people in your area. Others will follow soon…

Afrinnovator.com: Tell us about Upande – what is it all about, what are you involved in, what’s the vision for that…

Mark (Upande.com): Upande is an upstart which provides services in geo in the wide sense, particularly with an emphasis on the geoweb. The name was chosen as it refers to ‘location’, ‘direction’, ‘destination’, ‘alongside’ and ‘up’. All of which have a geo component and are actually terms commonly used in GIS. And it sounds Kenyan and is short. Currently we are hiring which is an exciting time as we build up a solid team! We are providing consulting services, managing projects, building applications and will be developing products and providing training as well.

Afrinnovator.com: Final words…?

Mark (Upande.com): Final words, ‘watch this space’ and ‘get in touch if this makes you tick’