MalaysiaGIS.com

Source: The Edge

Why? Because it plans to roll out a free online street directory of Kuala Lumpur and Johor, and wireless location based services on Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) phones and any other device that has a WAP browser. With dotcoms now in poor health, who in their right mind would be considering an Internet venture.

But the entreprising and courageous people behind Rimman VM Sdn Bhd, joint-venture company with RM1 million in capital, seem determined to prove the cynics wrong. "We are not hoping to generate the bulk of our income from banner advertisements. Neither are we banking on the WAP based services," says Zak Karim, its country manager. If he meant to reassure with those words, he has probably done the opposite. So where is the revenue coming from?

Firdhaus Akber, Rimman VM's director, shed some light. "We expect 10 percent to come from banner advertisements and our WAP services, respectively. Twenty percent will come from Internet services and the largest chunk, 60 percent, from consultancy services." The company has a RM30,000 monthly burn rate and has so far spent RM100,00 on office space, servers and computers hopes to be profitable by 2003. Hopefully it will still be around by then.

Meanwhile, the free web-based directory (www.streetdirectory.com), will be up by the end of this month while the wireless location-based service will be available in July, says Zak.

The directory will provide standard information on hotels, restaurants, mosques, roads, weather and even driving directions from one point to another.

The obvious synergy between both parties led to the venture. "We have the content and Virtual Map has the IT know-how that will help us expand our business," says Zak, predicting that there will be an increasing demand for location-based services. Besides, he adds, the company sees the Internet as a tool that can accelerate its business.

The main businesses of Rimman International, which started as a map company in 1984, is producing digital maps (the Kuala Lumpur and Klang Valley Street Directory, which has entered its third edition), data conversion such as the conversion of non-graphic digital databases and the manual redrawing or reformatting of records and maps.

Virtual Map, founded in Singapore in 1999, has offices in Australia, Bangkok, Hong Kong and Indonesia. It offers practical, easy-to-use map applications, geographical management information systems and tracking solutions to help individual users, corporations and government agencies access up-to-date location-specific information.

Internet services
Firdhaus elaborates that the Internet services they offer include hardware, software and maintenance support. The company will host and manage the hardware and software that run the applications, and provide the processing power for the customer via the Internet.

Services include a wide range of map display products (such as MapLite and PowerMaps) and vicinity search engines. "For example, the Maplite service is designed to generate value-added services for the traditional brick-and-mortar businesses of today's New Economy. It's ideal for retailers who have multiple outlets and for businesses that want to show driving directions to get to their office," he says.

The company also licenses its technology, such as its PowerMaps services, to other businesses. "This is ideal for portals, search engines and even schools or universities, or large corporations, to provide an online location based search engine," Firdhaus explains.

Other Internet services include web-based Global Positioning System (GPS) tracking solutions that come with detailed maps to trace a specific location.

"Tracking solutions provide a better competitive edge and lead to greater efficiency, especially for industries such as logistics for cargo vehicles monitoring, insurance for lost-car monitoring and car rentals for tracking," Firdhaus adds.

This service charts the position and status reports from all vehicles and displays the vehicles on a map in real time. Employers may even use the service to monitor the mileage claims of their staff.

With Geographical Management Information System (GMIS), customers can obtain a customised database. It allows businesses to request for demographical information within a particular location, for large distributors to plan and monitor their various distributions points, for businesses to monitor their distribution outlets and for users to access important mapping information, such as the number of restaurants already in an area.

For example, a large restaurant chain that offers home delivery service may find it difficult to determine the locations each outlets would service. With GMIS, not only would they be able to plot each location on Rimman VM's maps, they would also be able to geographically determine the areas their outlets would service.

"This prevents confusion and increases efficiency," Firdhaus points out. The consultancy services will help to design, develop and implement custom-mapping and location-based solutions for clients, include government agencies, telcos and the multinationals. The company expects to have a staff strength of 15 by the end of this year, from the present five.