About

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In 2004, Managing Director, Joe Francica, founded and chaired the first Location Intelligence Conference at the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. The objective of that event, and for the next 10 years, was to bring together the thought leaders from both the geospatial technology sector and business intelligence.  Over that period, there was a profound shift in the recognition of the value, use and applications of location-based data. 

Today, every BI software solution includes some level of geospatial analysis, and every GIS software solution has some capabilities found in BI. This convergence challenges users to understand how to determine the right tools and data to complete key business objectives. Francica was instrumental in fostering this change and has helped companies understand the value in becoming more location intelligent.

In addition, Francica helped to develop the Geospatial Competency Model for the U.S. Department of Labor; served on the National Visiting Committee for the National Science Foundation's Geospatial Technology Center of Excellence; developed the "Location Intelligence for Business" course for Penn State's online GIS program; and has been a thought leader through publications, podcasts, and has been an invited  keynoter at several events. He is the former editor-in-chief of Directions Magazine and has worked in senior management positions for both large companies and start-ups.

In 2012, Francica founded GEO Huntsville, a 501c6 non-profit, to support geospatial technology business and workforce development and serving Huntsville, Alabama Mayor Tommy Battle's economic development advisory council. He is currently a board member of the organization. He is also the executive director of an affiliate organization, Exemplar City®, a 501c3 non-profit organization for educational training that developed Blueprint for Safety® a model for technology deployment to support smart and resilient applications in geospatial, energy and cyber-security for city government.

Francica received his BA in Geology from Rutgers University (New Brunswick, New Jersey) in 1978, followed by an MA in Earth Science from Dartmouth College (Hanover, New Hampshire) in 1980, and an MBA from the Edwin L. Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University (Dallas, Texas) in 1989 where he focused on Marketing and Real Estate Finance.