Teledyne CARIS, A business unit of Teledyne Digital Imaging, Inc. is a Canadian software company that develops and supports geomatics software for marine and land applications. The company is headquartered in
Fredericton
Fredericton (; ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of New Brunswick. The city is situated in the west-central portion of the province along the Saint John River, which flows west to east as it bisects the city. The river is the do ...
, New Brunswick, Canada. CARIS also has offices in the Netherlands, the United States and Australia, and has re-sellers offering sales and support of software products to more than 75 countries.
History
The company was founded in Fredericton in 1979 as Universal Systems Ltd. and was a spin-off from research into data structures and computer-aided cartography at the
University of New Brunswick
The University of New Brunswick (UNB) is a public university with two primary campuses in Fredericton and Saint John, New Brunswick. It is the oldest English-language university in Canada, and among the oldest public universities in North Americ ...
's Department of Survey Engineering (now the Department of Geodesy and Geomatics Engineering). The company's first commercial software product was called "CARIS" whose acronym stood for "Computer Aided Resource Information System". The company name was changed from Universal Systems Ltd. to CARIS in the early 2000s in recognition of this first product and recognized brand. CARIS was wholly acquired on May 3, 2016, by international conglomerate
Teledyne Technologies
Teledyne Technologies Incorporated is an American industrial conglomerate. It was founded in 1960, as Teledyne, Inc., by Henry Singleton and George Kozmetsky.
From August 1996 to November 1999, Teledyne existed as part of the conglomerate Al ...
and renamed "Teledyne CARIS."
Products
Teledyne CARIS Inc. provides
Geographic Information Systems
A geographic information system (GIS) is a type of database containing geographic data (that is, descriptions of phenomena for which location is relevant), combined with software tools for managing, analyzing, and visualizing those data. In a br ...
(GIS) and related software for terrestrial applications such as land management, municipal planning and geology, as well as marine and hydrographic applications. The marine and hydrographic software is designed to handle the hydrographic workflow from the time sensor data is recorded through to its inclusion in a nautical chart or other GIS product. The company terms this the "Ping-to-Chart" workflow and has trademarked the term "Ping-to-Chart".
A CARIS Spatial Archive, often referred to as a CSAR file, is a data storage mechanism designed for storing large amounts of
bathymetric data.
Standards work
Teledyne CARIS Inc. is a member of the
Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) and is a proponent of interoperability between different GIS systems. It markets its own GIS server which implements several OGC specifications, including
Web Map Service (WMS) and
Web Feature Service (WFS).
Through liaisons with the
International Hydrographic Organization
The International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) is an intergovernmental organisation representing hydrography. , the IHO comprised 98 Member States.
A principal aim of the IHO is to ensure that the world's seas, oceans and navigable waters a ...
(IHO), and with the hydrographic community, Teledyne CARIS Inc. has been closely involved in the development of the S-57, S-100, and other IHO standards. The company has also participated in the development, implementation, production and usage of electronic chart specifications such as
Electronic Navigational Chart (ENC) and Digital Nautical Chart (DNC).
References
External links
www.caris.com - official website
{{Authority control
Software companies of Canada
Companies based in Fredericton
GIS software
Teledyne Technologies
Canadian companies established in 1979
Software companies established in 1979
2016 mergers and acquisitions
Canadian subsidiaries of foreign companies