EVERETT — Let’s say you’re a business owner who likes to play “what if?” with disaster scenarios.
What if a flood means my employees can’t get to work?
Will my office or shop be flooded if a 10-foot storm surge hits the Snohomish River?
What if a powerful eart
hquake damages bridges and highways?
Or, let’s say you’re doing some market research for your business.
Where do my customers live?
Where are my competitors in relation to my business?
What might be a good location to expand my operation?
You might be able to answ
er those questions — if you have time to go to myriad websites and pore over pages and documents looking for the right link to the right data. And then, how do you put any of it in perspective, much less try to use multiple data points?
That’s where Depiction software enters the scene.
Depiction lets small-business owners, emergency managers, disaster volunteers, families and first responders find location-based answers for the “what ifs?” they may face, said Depiction Inc. founder and board chairman Mike Geertsen.
“This helps people tell stories about their lives,” he said. “It lets you mix the real and fantasy, lets you ask that ‘What if?’ ”
The idea for Depiction started as a Microsoft project when the company’s game group was asked to retool some of its technology for the Department of Defense for flight simulation, Geertsen said. When that didn’t pan out, he left Microsoft in 2005 and founded Depiction Inc., opening in Everett in 2006.
The basic idea for Depiction was to get that data-driven technology to a level a Red Cross volunteer could use, Geertsen said.
Depiction users start answering their questions by entering an address or geographic point, which then generates an on-screen map that users can size as they’d like. Users connected to the Internet then can add any of up to 17 online data sources Depiction tracks, including satellite imagery, earthquakes, historical hurricane and tornado tracks, bodies of water, streets, topography, weather forecasts, wildfires and more.
Depiction users also can add an array of data points to the map by choosing an element definition and clicking on the map. If that’s not enough, users can import any spreadsheet data from .csv files and digital maps saved as .jpg or .bmp files.
With the data in place on the user’s map, it’s then a matter of manipulating variables to see what happens in any scenario they create.
“It’s almost like a ‘Sim City’ (video game) now,” Geertsen said. “It’s a living world. You haven’t just built a map.”
Depiction’s five employees constantly scour the Internet to keep data links from government and university Web portals and commercial sources up to date, but Depiction doesn’t store any data in its suite in the Washington State Council of County and City Employees’ office on Hoyt Avenue in Everett.
In fact, the Depiction maps and downloaded data are stored on each Depiction user’s own computer, not on the Web. Depiction CEO and President Richard Smith said the company debated the issue and saw more benefit in saving files to users’ disks, particularly for those who go to disaster areas without Internet access.
Geertsen said Depiction is data agnostic by design and the platform supports all open standards. It’s analogous to building a house: Depiction is the foundation on which users can build whatever they need.
That’s fine with the Depiction staff.
“We’re not the experts on how this works,” said Depiction marketing manager Tim Goddard.
Judging by the feedback of one amateur radio operator in North Carolina, Depiction works well, Smith said. The user said Depiction’s flood data estimates proved to be 90 percent accurate.
Snohomish County Depiction users include the City of Everett, Snohomish County Emergency Management, Red Cross, Salvation Army, Port of Everett, Premera Blue Cross, Community Transit, Housing Hope, YMCA, The Everett Clinic and Mark Wolken Consulting.
For $199, Depiction is an affordable way for business owners to create their own continuity plans to prepare for disaster. It works on Windows XP or newer operating systems, but not on a Mac.
Geertsen is glad he picked Everett as Depiction’s home, and he’s happy to have so many Depiction “early adopters” in Snohomish County.
“It’s been a wonderful microcosm to launch a small business,” he said.
But Geertsen is moving to Washington, D.C., this summer to become a program manager for the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. He’ll still remain involved with Depiction as the board chairman.
“I wasn’t looking for an opportunity with the government, but was honored when they offered me a multi-year appointment to envision and create innovative software solutions for our armed services,” Geertsen said. “It’s certainly a different audience and ‘market’ than I’m used to.”
“We call him ‘Depiction East,’ ” Goddard said.
“But only in my off time,” Geertsen said. “We’re very clear about that.”
Try Depiction yourself
On June 8, take part in a virtual business continuity exercise that uses Depiction’s software to help business owners prepare for disaster. See the potential effects of a 7.4-magnitude earthquake on your business, get expert advice on other potential disasters and how to prepare for them, and learn how to build a disaster plan to help your doors stay open.
Included in the exercise is a full copy of Depiction. Bring spreadsheets of employees, customers and business relationships so you can make a custom interactive disaster planning scenario. Depiction Inc. is partnering with Emc4 consulting for this workshop.
Go to www.depiction.com/bcexercise to register or for more information or email info@depiction.com.
Kurt Batdorf: 425-339-3102, kbatdorf@scbj.com.
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