got geoint?

Welcome to the Monday Morning News Kick Off post from got geoint? How can we top last week’s MMNKO post all about the taking down of Bin Laden? Oh yes, this week is GEOINT Community Week and the sold out USGIF Invitational kicks off at 1 p.m. today. And, of course, we have plenty of other GEOINT-related news to showcase this morning. So, as we always say, fire up that second cup of coffee and read on! Happy Monday!

GEOINT Community Week Kicks Off!
Held annually in the Washington metro area, GEOINT Community Week brings together stakeholders within the geospatial intelligence tradecraft for a week of networking, classified briefings, exhibits and learning workshops. GEOINT Community Week provides valuable and unique opportunities for the GEOINT Community to experience and showcase the latest geospatial intelligence technologies and capabilities.

USGIF Member Companies Dominate Washington Technology’s Top 100 Contractor’s List
It goes without saying the USGIF member companies are comprised of the world’s leading defense and technology contractors. And, it is always exciting when the premier trade magazine that covers technology innovations in the DC area recognizes these leading contractors in its Top 100 Government Contractors List. And, here’s the list of USGIF member companies that made the cut this year: Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman Corp., Boeing Co., Raytheon Co., SAIC, General Dynamics, L-3, Booz Allen Hamilton, Computer Sciences Corp (CSC), Dell Computer Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co., Harris Corp., ITT Corp., BAE Systems, CACI International Inc., IBM, Deloitte LLP, Verizon, Accenture, Serco, SRA International, ManTech International Corp., AT&T Inc., Alliant Techsystems (ATK), Cubic Corp. (Cubic Cyber Solutions is the member), Sierra Nevada Corp., Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp., Oracle Corp., Orbital Sciences Corp., Concurrent Technologies Corp. And Carahsoft Technology Corp.

May/June Pathfinder Highlights NGA Support to the Military
The May/June 2011 issue of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency Pathfinder magazine, now available online at, includes several articles highlighting NGA’s support for the military: NGA and Army Civil Affairs—A Natural Evolution of Fused Civil Intelligence; Supporting the African Continent with GEOINT; Army GEOINT: Engineering and Intelligence Communities Join Together; The Ground Truth—Putting the Power of GEOINT in the Hands of the Warfighter. Other features describe NGA’s growing relationship with In-Q-Tel, how NGA honors tradition by providing burial at sea charts, and a look back almost 50 years at the early days in Laos and Vietnam. Be sure to check out the full issue here.

SAR Working Group Started
The U.S. Geospatial Intelligence Foundation has formed a commercial Synthetic Aperture Radar Satellite working group to advance space-based SAR. The Virginia organization also announced training at U.S. military’s Pacific Command. The CSARS Working Group comprises USGIF members MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates Ltd., the commercial provider of RADARSAT-1 data and operator of RADARSAT-2; Infoterra GmbH, the German part of Astrium GEO-Information Services and the commercial operator of TerraSAR-X and TanDEM-X; and e-GEOS S.p.A., the commercial provider of COSMO-SkyMed constellation data. Read the full UPI story here.

Intelligence Fusion Got Bin Laden
The daring raid that killed Osama bin Laden represents a triumph for thousands of anonymous federal intelligence employees, and a validation for scores of reforms made to the battered intelligence community over the last decade. The government’s inability to prevent the Sept. 11 attacks, accurately assess Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction capability, and stop the failed Christmas Day underwear bomber in 2009 drew harsh criticism and prompted drastic overhauls of the nation’s intelligence operations. The government created an Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) to oversee all 16 intelligence agencies, rebuilt the analyst workforce that withered during the post-Cold War 1990s, recruited operators and analysts with crucial Middle Eastern language skills and cultural knowledge, and broke down walls — both cultural and structural — that kept agencies from sharing vital information with one another. Read the full Federal Times story here.

Japanese Government to Speed Up Issuing of Disaster Damage Certificates with Hitachi and TerraGo
Hitachi Solutions, Ltd., as part of its effort to assist in the reconstruction following the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, has donated a TerraGo® GeoPDF® map atlas to the central Japanese government, disaster response headquarters and local governments. By utilizing TerraGo GeoPDF pre- and post-March 11 maps and imagery in residential damage assessment, clerical work of issuing disaster damage certificates can be dramatically simplified. GeoPDF maps are easy to both view and update from the field and can also be put to effective use in the planning for reconstruction efforts. Distribution of the GeoPDF maps to the disaster response headquarters and local governments in the affected Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures will be carried out by the Japanese Cabinet Office. Read the full press release here.

Tags: GEOINT and BIn Laden, GEOINT Community Week, geospatial intelligence, got geoint?, NGA, NGA Pathfinder, TerraGo, Terrago and Hitachi, United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation, USGIF