Thales and Airbus to produce new digital maps

The French National Geographic and Forestry Information Institute (IGN) has awarded the Thales-Airbus Defence and Space consortium the GeoMaps contract for the next six years. The French armed forces will get high added-value geographical data that will give them the upper hand in missions in theatres of operations.

The data will mainly be based on images acquired by the two Pléiades satellites, significantly increasing the accuracy of the maps to be produced. This contract runs from 2016 to 2021 and guarantees the consistent geometry and formatting of all reference mapping data to optimise interoperability between the French Ministry of Defence’s different systems and services, as well as with their allies and partners.