Kiwi software tracked Oz floods

The AAM software showing the Queensland floods has been shown by media organisations. Photo / AAM

A New Zealand-designed software platform lay behind the computer-generated images of the Brisbane flood broadcast by news organisations on both sides of the Tasman this week.

Australia's AAM, a Sydney-based firm that specialises in aerial mapping, acquired the intellectual property and existing business of Data Interface Technologies, a Kiwi outfit, in 2009. The outfit developed the K2Vi software that generated the 3D models of the disaster that were screened in Australia and here.

AAM general manager Brian Nicholls said the company produced the flood simulation maps of Brisbane prior to this week's devastating floods, which were then posted on the firm's website and YouTube.

"When [the floods] started happening it just went ballistic and we've had over 100,000 hits over the last week on YouTube."

He said news organisations were quickly on the phone to the company, asking if they could include the flood simulation maps in their bulletins. The models were created using high-resolution aerial photography, and airborne laser scanning, in which a device shoots laser beams at the ground 100,000 times each second.

"What we can do from that is measure the shape from the ground," said Nicholls. "Then we mash all that together to make these 3D models and we provide that data to our clients." The main customers were state and local governments, which used it for town planning. It is also used by mining firms for mine planning and management.

He said: "Media is always interesting and attractive because you get exposure ... but the media generally doesn't pay us for what we do. Unfortunately that doesn't pay the bills," said Nicholls.

AAM is part-owned by Knox Investment Partners, an Auckland-based private equity firm.