I had the pleasure of interviewing Karolina Mosiadz, COO of Mapple, an urban intelligence startup.
Can you say a few words about yourself and your role in the Mapple team?
As a marketer, I help early-stage companies find product-market fit, get first customers and start scaling. I focus on projects that aim to bring a positive impact to their respective industries and society as a whole. At Mapple I handle most of our front facing operations which range from business development and sales to pitching on stage.
How did Mapple come about and what’s the problem that you’re trying to solve?
Mapple is a spin-off from the Digital Geography Lab at the University of Helsinki. Our technology is based on research and models developed by one of our co-founders, Henrikki Tenkanen. Mapple’s first prototype was built to help Helsinki better understand city dynamics. Mapple’s tools helped create a general city plan, evaluate the impact of a new metro line and analyze how people use city bikes.
For years real estate companies and cities relied on their knowledge and peer network to understand the areas and the needs of the residents. It was enough to run an analysis every five or ten years. Now, when the rate of change is much faster, this kind of analysis quickly becomes outdated. There is more data available that should be taken into account. Companies and cities lack the time and resources to properly evaluate their planned developments and investments.
What’s your solution in a nutshell and who uses it already?
Mapple’s location
intelligence software helps cities and real estate companies better understand
the area they are planning to develop in terms of people, infrastructure and
ease of access. Mapple helps forecast the impact of planned developments and
provides insights on sustainability (for example CO2 emissions). Our software
is used by municipalities, real estate brokers, private investors and big
corporations.
How can cities benefit from using location data the way you suggest?
Understanding how
people move and interact with the city is a key to better planning and reaching
sustainability goals. These analysis run by GIS teams supported by external
consultants take time, require manual work and are often inefficient. Due to
time limitations and problems acquiring and processing data only certain
perspectives are analysed. Ideas get buried because there is often more work
than the analysts can handle.
Mapple not only makes
it easier to collaborate and share the insights, but cuts down the time of
running complex analysis from a few weeks to just a few minutes. Equipped with
up to date and easy to consume analysis, city officials can make fast, well
informed and data driven decisions.
What kind of companies would benefit from your solution and how?
Using Mapple companies
can quickly evaluate their existing and planned sites and assets – who lives,
passes through and spends time there, what kind of infrastructure is in place
and what is missing, what kind of businesses are in the area, how accessible
and serviceable the area is and how will it change over the next few years.
Companies can also see how multiple locations compare to each other based on
different parameters.
Our software is aimed
at real estate developers and investors but any company that wants to better
understand the existing or future location of their business or office can
benefit from Mapple.
What’s required from a customer who would like to use your solution?
Mapple doesn’t need any
training and anyone can start using it from day one. There is no need to
acquire data streams separately, everything needed is already included in the
package. Customer can choose to use our interactive dashboard, implement our
API with their existing systems or choose to get a static report on one or
multiple locations. If they so choose, they can also upload their own data sets
to Mapple.
How is your solution unique or different from what’s available already?
Our software can be
used by anyone and doesn’t require extensive training like legacy professional
GIS programs available on the market. What usually takes an analyst a couple of
days or weeks, can be done with Mapple in minutes. Instead of aggregating data,
we use models and algorithms to find connections between data sets and provide
our customers with actionable insights and recommendations. Thanks to that we
are able to for example provide up to 70% more accurate analysis of people
flows.
How do you see the future of your business?
There is a number of
emerging markets for geospatial analysis including real estate, smart cities
and outdoor advertising. Especially now, with urbanisation on the rise and
pressing sustainability issues, we see a global potential for efficient, data
driven urban planning and development.
How can our readers connect with you?
Check out our demo at analyst.mapple.io and
follow us on Twitter (@MappleAnalytics) and LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/mapple).
If you would like to know more, please reach out to me at
.
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