Location technology forum and spatiotemporal intelligence dialogue held in Guiyang

The 5th Location Technology Forum and Spatiotemporal Intelligence Dialogue was held in Guiyang, capital of Southwest China's Guizhou province, on Aug 29.

The forum, with the tagline "Intelligent Spatiotemporal Information: New Quality Empowering Industrialization," aimed to implement national strategies for the development of the digital economy, promoting the deep integration of the digital and real economies and enhancing the role of location services in various industries for the benefit of society.

Prominent figures such as Academician Pan Delu of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, Academician Zhou Chenghu of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Academician Chen Xuegeng of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, and Jiang Weiping, director of the Institute of Scientific Development of Wuhan University, attended the event and delivered keynote speeches.

The forum also featured dialogues on the empowerment and application of spatiotemporal information and highlighted the importance of satellite navigation systems as crucial spatial infrastructure and information security.

In recent years, the Beidou-centric navigation and location service industry has flourished. The applications of "Beidou+" and "+Beidou" have expanded across various fields, with satellite navigation device shipments in the transportation sector growing by over 10 percent. Traditional markets such as smartphones, wearable devices, and in-car navigation systems have also seen a resurgence in shipments.

In 2023, the daily usage of Beidou positioning services exceeded 600 billion instances, with peak usage surpassing 1 trillion instances.

Beidou chips, modules, and antennas have rapidly evolved, making Beidou a standard feature in smartphones and wearable devices. The Beidou system now serves users in over 200 countries and regions worldwide, with Beidou-enabled mobile terminals comprising more than half of global mobile terminals.

Guizhou has actively promoted the integration of "Beidou + Big Data," significantly enhancing "location services + applications," thereby offering strong support for the development of the digital economy.

The forum emphasized that surveying and mapping geographic information, as vital strategic data resource and new production factor, plays a fundamental and pioneering role in national governance, empowering various industries, serving countless households and supporting high-quality development.

"Real-world 3D China" reflects the true, three-dimensional, and temporal aspects of China, enabling the interconnection of digital and real spaces.

As a key piece of spatial geographic infrastructure, accelerating the construction of Real-World 3D China and the application of spatiotemporal information is strategically significant to the advancement of Chinese modernization through digital China initiatives.

It was noted at the forum that through relentless efforts, a new generation of 10-meter grid digital elevation models has been developed, with 1:50,000 and smaller scale topographic maps covering all of China’s national territory. Series of spatial geographic databases have been established and regularly updated, accumulating vast data resources.

Since 2022, to meet the growing demand for real-world 3D data, approximately 7 million square kilometers of detailed terrain, urban, and component-level 3D models have been developed nationwide.

This includes 17 versions of imagery data with resolutions better than 2 meters covering all of China's land territory and three versions with resolutions better than 1 meter for key areas.

Over 3,000 satellite navigation positioning reference stations within the national natural resources system have been integrated, forming a Beidou-based national satellite navigation positioning reference network capable of providing centimeter-level navigation and positioning services. This unified spatiotemporal foundation supports the development of a digital and beautiful China.