Ordnance Survey Signs £23 Million Agreement With Openreach

SOUTHAMPTON, England, April 22, 2014 /PRNewswire/ --

Ordnance Survey has entered into a new five-year agreement with Openreach (a part of BT Group) worth over £23 million for the supply of a range of data products, services and value added solutions. 

Ordnance Survey's relationship with BT dates back to the mid 1990's, when location data and geographical information systems (GIS) were recognised as a key component of the company's IS and operations strategy. Accurate location data now provides a valuable resource to many areas of the business, from assisting call centre teams in efficiently managing customer calls to underpinning the popular online phone directory. The agreement also enables Openreach to supply Ordnance Survey data to contractors to support a wide range of projects, including engineering and maintenance.

Andrew Loveless, Commercial Director at Ordnance Survey, says: "I am truly delighted that the new agreement means Ordnance Survey can continue to work directly with Openreach. We have always had an excellent relationship and I expect that this new five-year deal will see this develop further. Ordnance Survey is now firmly positioned at the heart of the utility sector and the data and services we provide really adds value to the industry. This is a real success story, demonstrating yet again that the use of location data can deliver real business benefits."

Under the five year agreement, worth £4.6 million per year, Openreach will access a range of Ordnance Survey's premium datasets including OS MasterMap Topography Layer, OS MasterMap Integrated Transport Network Layer, OS VectorMap Local and 1:50 000 Scale Colour Raster. The agreement also includes a range of addressing solutions providing an intelligent suite of products to support operational and insight work.

The agreement will see Openreach extending their use of Ordnance Survey's web mapping service, OS OnDemand. The service enables Openreach, and their engineers, to access detailed and up-to-date data, providing information on road geometry, house numbers, landmarks and building names.

Ordnance Survey is reinforcing the relationship by also providing expertise and technical advice to Openreach on a number of other projects. The two organisations will be collaborating on a number of additional services, such as desktop analysis of locations for engineer visits, to maximise the benefits and efficiencies available from the highly detailed data accessed under the agreement.

Other collaborations include exploring the introduction and utilisation of an asset tagger solution and understanding how Ordnance Survey can support Openreach in mapping their assets, such as street fibre cabinets. This later project will be delivered by a value-added service as part of Ordnance Survey's continuous data capture operation. Ordnance Survey is responsible for the maintenance and management of the geospatial database for Great Britain. This sophisticated database contains over 460 million geographic features and is updated on average 10,000 times a day.

Andrew added: "This is a strategically important agreement for both organisations and I am looking forward to building on our existing relationship by working on a number of exciting collaborative projects. The new agreement is more than just data, it is about delivering value for Openreach and ultimately supporting Openreach in providing the highest level of products and services to its millions of customers.

"The recognition of the importance of location data, services and solutions by businesses has grown significantly over the last five years. Openreach are one of many businesses who benefit from the use of location data - today intelligent data is helping to deliver efficiencies, support growth, underpin decision making and enable greater customer insight."

For more information from Ordnance Survey, please contact: Robert Andrews - Head of Corporate Communications on +44(0)23-8005-5563 or robert.andrews@ordnancesurvey.co.uk