Spatial Energistics Group, Inc.

Spatial Energistics Group Inc., a new business operating from Boutiliers Point, Nova Scotia, converts complex data into information that clients can use to make sound business decisions.

“If you look at many organizations today, one of the challenges they are often faced with is information management,” says company CEO and co-owner Chris Turner. “We come in and help them organize ways that they can get access to that information, and pull metrics out of that information, which allows them to make informed decisions. The savings are immeasurable.”

Turner offers as an example a transmission facility charged with putting up towers across a vast northern region. “There’s a huge amount of data that’s collected on the ground or in the air, by biologists, by foresters, by engineers, by archeologists, and all those folks in order to define let’s say an environmental assessment plan.” Spatial Energistics helps define where that route needs to go by converting that information to spatial or geographic information.

“We then take it a step further and use that information within our decision support systems so their planning teams can begin to crunch their information for selecting the best routes,” Turner says. “It’s quite neat to watch when your clients see the digital maps on the computer screen begin to rule out potential routing options. It does a lot of the thinking for them and helps make their jobs easier. Once again their decision can be based on facts because they have the results in front of them.”

Facts can be represented as spatial information through the company’s special expertise in geographic information system (GIS) technologies. “Have you ever looked at a document with all numbers in it?” Turner says. “All numbers, no maps? It’s very difficult to visualize. Eighty per cent of any organization’s data has a spatial context to it, and most organizations are just beginning to realize it.”

Spatial Energistics, which was launched in April, has targeted the environmental and energy sectors, a decision based on the sectors’ ongoing strength and the professional background of the company’s core employees. Clients are offered a suite of services including; project management, business analysis, enterprise GIS, information/asset management and decision support systems.

“When we go into an organization to do something we end up doing other services for them because they’re related,” Turner explains. “Say you want to do a project which requires putting in a new transmission line. We can help you do both the project management and the information management components along with the mapping support required for regulatory and planning purposes. Our lines of service strategy is to align to as many touch points as possible within the chosen organization. It simply positions us for a better opportunity for long-term sustainable work.”

The corporation has clients in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Alberta, and British Columbia, and recently an international client. In spring 2009, Spatial Energistics signed a memorandum of understanding with L & S Surveying Services Limited in Trinidad and Tobago.

“It’s a really interesting and wonderful story,” Turner says. “When we first started our company we were told time and time again by others who had visited the area or others who had been trying to break into these markets that it will take you a year to even build a relationship down there. My partner and I came up with a plan and a strategy and we jumped on an airplane and flew to Trinidad.”

The story has a happy ending (Turner expresses his appreciation to Nova Scotia Business Inc. and a Caribbean liaison for their support.) “We knew within two weeks that we found an organization down there that we wanted to work with, and they felt exactly the same,” Turner says.

“Their expertise in GIS services is of special interest to us because that is a market we’re trying to enter in Trinidad,” says Sasha Addo, managing director of L & S Surveying Services Limited, which he describes as the leading and largest surveying and mapping company in Trinidad and Tobago. “Our principles and philosophies are also very similar. The individuals are people that we can relate well with and feel very comfortable doing business with.”

While travel is part of their consulting work, Spatial Energistics is also virtually connected to the world from Nova Scotia. Employees, including co-owner and Vice-President, Business Development, Chad Amirault, operate from home offices and do a lot of virtual teaming.

The company currently draws on contractors, however, Turner says in the next six months Spatial Energistics is expected to grow and open a local office within Halifax. National expansion plans are also under development based on requests from some of their clients. “We plan on putting skilled employees in seats in Nova Scotia doing national and international work,” he says. “That’s bringing money into the homes of Nova Scotians.”

And Nova Scotia is where Turner wants to be. “I have lots of friends and family here and I have no interest in moving elsewhere. I’ve been offered many opportunities for national and international opportunities, but I can’t live on a postage stamp. I have an acre of land now and a beautiful house overlooking the ocean. I just can’t change that.”