IGN
IGN is France's national geographic and forest information institute, producing sovereign cartographic data, LiDAR HD, and AI-powered geomatic services for government ministries, citizens, and professionals through cartes.gouv.fr and its reference data platforms.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded1940
- HeadquartersSaint-mandé, France
- Headcount1,001–5,000
- GTM typeB2B and B2C
- OfferingSoftware
What IGN does
IGN (Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière) is France's national geographic and forest information institute, founded in 1940 and operating as a public administrative institution (établissement public administratif) under the supervision of the ministries of ecology and forestry. Headquartered in Saint-Mandé with 1,001-5,000 employees, IGN produces and disseminates sovereign cartographic and forest data to support public policy across metropolitan France and overseas territories. Its core mandate covers territorial observation, mapping, geodetic reference, and forest inventory, making it the authoritative data source for decisions on land use, ecological transition, defense cartography (via Géomaps), and address referencing (Base Adresse Nationale serving 1 billion+ monthly queries).
The institute's technology stack combines national-scale LiDAR HD acquisition (covering 80% of French territory at 3 petabytes and 10 points/m² average density), aerial and satellite imagery processing (Copernicus Sentinel-2 fusion), and proprietary deep-learning models — including the MAESTRO foundation model (presented at WACV 2026), CoSIA land-cover classifier at 20cm resolution, Frame Field building detection, and PureForest tree species discrimination. The GéoLLM Model Context Protocol enables natural-language queries against IGN databases. IGN's product surface centers on cartes.gouv.fr (launched June 2026 as a unified portal to 1,100+ cartographic layers, replacing Géoportail), complemented by LiDAR HD, OCS GE land-use classification, BD TOPO and BD Forêt reference databases, the Panoramax street-level platform (110M+ photographs co-developed with OpenStreetMap), the Cartes IGN mobile app, and professional APIs (geoservices.ign.fr, Circé coordinate conversion, RGP GNSS network). Open datasets (FLAIR, PureForest) and foundation models are published on HuggingFace.
IGN's revenue is predominantly government budget allocations for public service missions, supplemented by modest commercial streams including physical map and aerial photograph sales via boutique.ign.fr (€6.90 digital files, €14.10 paper maps, €36 aerial photographs), professional geodetic services, and e-commerce through retail partners. Customer segments span individual citizens (free cartes.gouv.fr and mobile app), public policy actors (ministries, regions, municipalities), professionals (geomatics firms, Datalliance partners such as Kayrros, Preligens, namR, TerraNIS, Netcarbon), teachers and students, and defense/security services. Distribution combines self-serve PLG (cartes.gouv.fr, mobile apps, Remonter le temps), e-commerce (boutique.ign.fr), reseller network (Le Vieux Campeur, Fnac), and enterprise APIs, with strategic coordination via the Fabrique de la donnée territoriale incubator (ANCT/DINUM/CNIG) and the Datalliance public-private network.
IGN firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- IGN
- Legal name
- Institut national de l'information géographique et forestière
- Website
- https://ign.fr
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 1940
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 1,001–5,000 employees
- Short description
- IGN is France's national geographic and forest information institute, producing sovereign cartographic data, LiDAR HD, and AI-powered geomatic services for government ministries, citizens, and professionals through cartes.gouv.fr and its reference data platforms.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Where IGN is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- Saint-mandé
- HQ country
- France
- HQ region
- Europe
Offices1 record
Markets served
IGN business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2B and B2C
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Personnel, Technology or R&D, Operations, Infrastructure, Marketing or Sales
Revenue model
- Government Public Funding: IGN operates as a public data operator under the supervision of ministries responsible for ecology and forests. Core funding comes from government budget allocations for public service missions.
- Map and Document Sales: Revenue from selling physical maps, custom map printing, aerial photographs and documents. Digital map files from 6.90€ TTC, paper prints from 14.10€ TTC, aerial photographs at 36€ TTC per digital file.
- Professional Services and Data: Revenue from professional data services, specialized geodetic calculations, and custom territorial analysis services for public policy support.
Pricing tiers
| Model | Billing | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Freemium | Pay-as-you-go | Free public cartographic services |
| One time/ perpetual license | Pay-as-you-go | Digital map file |
| One time/ perpetual license | Pay-as-you-go | Paper map printing |
| One time/ perpetual license | Pay-as-you-go | Aerial photograph digital file |
| Unit Pricing | Pay-as-you-go | Student discount - 20 digital map files |
Go-to-market motion2 records
Distribution channels8 records
Marketing channels12 records
IGN product offering
Product offeringCore offering
IGN produces and disseminates sovereign geographic and forest information for France, operating the unified cartes.gouv.fr platform that provides free access to over 1,100 cartographic layers covering urban planning, cadastre, agriculture, forests, and energy. It builds and maintains national reference databases (BD TOPO, BD Forêt, LiDAR HD, OCS GE, BAN, RNB), develops proprietary AI foundation models (MAESTRO, CoSIA, GéoLLM) for automated cartographic production, and sells physical maps, custom prints, and aerial photographs through its boutique.
Product overview
IGN operates as France's national geographic and forest information institute, offering a comprehensive platform-based portfolio of geographic data products and services. The core offering centers on cartes.gouv.fr, a unified public cartographic portal that consolidates over 1,100 cartographic layers covering urban planning, cadastre, agriculture, forests, and energy. This platform integrates multiple complementary products including Ma Carte (interactive mapping), Remonter le temps (historical imagery), Panoramax (street-level photography), and the Application Cartes IGN mobile app. IGN provides extensive data products including LiDAR HD (3D terrain mapping), OCS GE (land use classification), BD TOPO (topographic database), BD Forêt (forest database), CoSIA (AI land cover predictions), and CarHab (habitat mapping). Geodetic services include the permanent GNSS network, Circé coordinate conversion software, and online calculation tools. The institute also operates innovation platforms including Datalliance (startup network), Fabrique de la donnée territoriale (data co-production incubator), and IGNfab (prototyping unit). Key AI offerings include the MAESTRO foundation model, GéoLLM natural language interface, and datasets like PureForest and FLAIR. IGN publishes the annual Atlas de l'anthropocène and IGN Mag, while the Observatoire des forêts françaises provides forest monitoring data.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Brands
- Cartes IGN: Free mobile application for discovering France, its riches, and its evolution over time
- Géodésie de poche
- Datalliance
- Fabrique de la donnée territoriale
- IGNfab
- Panoramax
- Base Adresse Nationale
- Référentiel National des Bâtiments
- Géodésie IGN
- Ma Carte
- Remonter le temps
- Géodata Paris
Products and services
- cartes.gouv.fr Unified public cartographic platform providing free access to over 1,100 cartographic layers covering urban planning, cadastre, agriculture, forests, and energy. Replaces legacy services and integrates Panoramax street-level imagery.
- Application Cartes IGN Free mobile application for discovering France, its natural richness, and territorial evolution over time. Available on Google Play and App Store.
- Ma Carte Interactive mapping tool allowing users to create personalized maps, locate addresses, and visualize geographic data.
- Remonter le temps Historical map and aerial photograph viewer enabling comparison of old and current maps and aerial imagery, with free download of pre-2016 photographs.
- Panoramax Open-source street-level photography platform co-developed with OpenStreetMap, allowing crowdsourced contributions and free reuse of over 110 million photographs.
- LiDAR HD National 3D mapping program producing classified LiDAR point clouds and 3D terrain models (DTM, DSM, DHM) at average 10 points per square meter across French territory.
- OCS GE (Occupation du Sol à Grande Échelle) Large-scale national land use classification system distinguishing impermeable, agricultural, and forest zones to quantify territory evolution and artificialization.
- BD TOPO Reference topographic database describing French territory with vector objects including buildings, roads, hydrography, and land use.
- BD Forêt Forest database providing detailed mapping including species identification, forest/non-forest masks, and tree species classification.
- CoSIA (Couverture du Sol par Intelligence Artificielle) AI-generated land cover prediction maps produced by deep learning analysis of aerial imagery at 20cm per pixel resolution.
- CarHab National cartographic modeling of natural and semi-natural terrestrial habitats for French metropolitan and overseas ecosystems at 1:25,000 scale.
- Géodésie Services Reference geodetic information services for professionals including access to geodetic fiches, permanent GNSS network (RGP), online coordinate calculations, PPP processing, and conversion grids.
- Circé Coordinate conversion software allowing transformation between geodetic reference systems. Available as downloadable software v5.
- Géodésie de poche Mobile application for finding French geodetic points and leveling benchmarks on smartphones, available on Google Play and App Store.
- Observatoire des forêts françaises Reference portal for French forest data coordinated by IGN, providing territorial indicators including mortality, health, wood resources, and carbon sequestration through interactive maps.
- Boutique IGN Online store for purchasing IGN physical maps, custom map printing, and aerial photographs. Digital map files from 6.90€ TTC, paper prints from 14.10€ TTC, aerial photographs at 36€ TTC per digital file.
- Jumeau numérique de la France Digital twin of France and its territories under development with Cerema and Inria under France 2030, enabling scenario simulation for weather, planning decisions, and public policy support.
- Portail des énergies renouvelables (ENR) Portal for renewable energy mapping and data, developed for DGEC (Direction générale de l'énergie et du climat) to support energy transition planning.
- Base Adresse Nationale (BAN) National address database developed as a state startup, aggregating commune-produced Local Address Databases into a national reference. Supports over 1 billion monthly queries from emergency services, delivery companies, and network operators.
- Référentiel National des Bâtiments (RNB) National building register creating unique identifiers for each building in France. Jointly carried by Ademe, CSTB, and IGN, federating building data stakeholders nationally.
- MAESTRO Foundation Model Foundation AI model pre-trained on large unannotated data volumes, achieving state-of-the-art performance on forest database production with reduced annotated data requirements. Open source on HuggingFace.
- GéoLLM Geographic LLM interface using Model Context Protocol to connect AI assistants to IGN databases, enabling natural language queries against geographic data without GIS expertise.
- Géomaps Operational cartographic solution for national defense, providing detailed geographic data for military applications.
- Registre Parcellaire Graphique (RPG) Graphic parcel register for agriculture providing land parcel boundaries and agricultural aid data. Supports Common Agricultural Policy payments and land use monitoring.
Quantifiable outcome
- 73%+ classification accuracy for land cover and land use in first departments produced
- +5 more outcomes
Companies that use IGN
Customer profileNamed customers7 records
Segments5 records
Ideal customer profiles5 records
IGN technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- Yes
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Integration3 records
AI capability9 records
Feature10 records
IGN partnerships and signals
Strategic signalPartnerships
27 partnerships are on record, tiered core, member and minor.
- OpenStreetMapcoreCo-development of Panoramax, an open alternative to Google Street View. OpenStreetMap contributes to and benefits from shared street-level photography database with over 110 million images. Mutual collaboration on open geographic data standards.
- TerraNISmemberToulouse-based company specializing in crossing and processing geolocated data from various sources (satellite images, agronomic-meteorological models, in-situ data) to propose turnkey services for precision agriculture development. Joined Datalliance network at VivaTech 2024.
- NetcarbonmemberBordeaux-based company combining satellite and airborne geographic data to study carbon storage evolution induced by development projects. Joined Datalliance network at VivaTech 2024.
- namRcoreFirst Datalliance project (2023) developed and deployed AI tool for identifying ground-mounted photovoltaic panels from automatic processing of aerial photographs. Addressed urgent need from DGALN for complementary land use data compatible with OCS GE.
- 1spatialmemberDatalliance network member specializing in geographic data quality and integration solutions.
- GEOfitmemberDatalliance network member specializing in geographic information technologies.
- I-SeamemberDatalliance network member specializing in satellite imagery and earth observation services.
- KayrrosmemberDatalliance network member providing AI-powered environmental intelligence from satellite and geospatial data.
- KERMAPmemberDatalliance network member specializing in cartographic and geographic data solutions.
- LuxCartamemberDatalliance network member providing geospatial intelligence and mapping solutions.
- PreligensmemberDatalliance network member specializing in AI-powered geospatial analysis for defense and security.
- ProméthéememberDatalliance network member providing earth observation and geographic intelligence services.
- SpaceSensememberDatalliance network member specializing in satellite-based analytics and geospatial AI solutions.
- Bordeaux TechnowestminorStartup incubator partnership to support Datalliance in identifying innovative actors. First regional partnership to leverage IGN territorial directorates for ecosystem engagement.
- ANCT (Agence nationale de la cohésion des territoires)coreFounding partner of Fabrique de la donnée territoriale and sponsor of Base Adresse Nationale. Key partner in digital transformation of territories.
- CNIG (Conseil national de l'information géolocalisée)coreFounding partner of Fabrique de la donnée territoriale. National council for geolocated information ensuring coordination of geographic data standards.
- DINUM (Direction interministérielle du numérique)coreFounding partner of Fabrique de la donnée territoriale and sponsor of Base Adresse Nationale. Leads interministerial digital transformation efforts.
- FNCCRcoreCo-organizer of Forum de la donnée territoriale and founding partner of Fabrique de la donnée territoriale. Represents local authorities in energy and digital matters.
- ANSSIminorPartner in Transformation numérique des territoires 2025-2027 program, providing cybersecurity expertise for digital commons development.
- AI4GEO ConsortiumminorConsortium for AI solutions development for satellite imagery analysis. IGN participates in collaborative research on AI applications for geographic data.
- AdemecorePartner in Référentiel National des Bâtiments (RNB) project, providing funding and environmental expertise for building identifier system development.
- CSTB (Centre scientifique et technique du bâtiment)corePartner in Référentiel National des Bâtiments (RNB) project, providing technical building expertise for national building identifier system.
- Greentech InnovationminorPartnership to identify innovative companies in green technology for potential Datalliance network participation.
- SHOM (Service hydrographique et océanographique de la Marine)minorCollaboration on tide gauge measurements and sea level observation, responsible for processing and distributing marigraphic data from Marseille.
- Université de La RochelleminorAcademic partner in SONEL (Système d'observation du niveau des eaux littorales) program for coastal water level observation.
- DGALN (Direction générale de l'aménagement, du logement et de la nature)coreMinistry department receiving AI-generated land use and photovoltaic panel data for Zero Net Artificialisation (ZAN) policy monitoring.
- Beta.gouvcoreGovernment startup incubator hosting Fabrique de la donnée territoriale and its incubated projects (BAN, RNB, Panoramax) using product method approach.
Scale indicators11 records
Recent moves8 records
Expansion highlights6 records
IGN competitors and assessment
Company assessmentDirect peers
- Ordnance Survey: The UK's national mapping agency, with a comparable sovereign mandate to produce authoritative geographic data for Great Britain. Operates a similar mix of open data, commercial data products, APIs, and partner ecosystem, and faces the same competitive dynamic versus GAFAM mapping platforms.
- Bundesamt für Kartographie und Geodäsie (BKG): Germany's federal agency for cartography and geodesy, producing national topographic data, geodetic reference systems, and 3D terrain models under a sovereign mandate. Highly comparable in mission, scale of national reference data, and public-sector positioning to IGN.
- Lantmäteriet: Sweden's national land surveying and mapping authority, delivering cadastral, geodetic, and topographic data. Comparable in mandate (sovereign geographic and land data) and in offering both free public services and commercial data products.
- Kadaster: The Netherlands' land registry and mapping agency, maintaining cadastral records, topographic data, and national address/key-register infrastructure. Comparable in operating a national address database (BAG) similar to IGN's BAN, with public-sector governance.
- Instituto Geográfico Nacional (Spain): Spain's national geographic institute, producing official cartography, geodetic data, and national reference datasets. Shares IGN's structure of a national geographic institute under ministry supervision and serves a similarly sovereign role in its country.
- swisstopo: Switzerland's federal topographic office and national mapping agency, producing high-quality geospatial reference data and operating open-data platforms analogous to cartes.gouv.fr. Comparable in scale, mandate, and quality of national reference datasets.
Broad incumbents
- United States Geological Survey (USGS): The US federal science agency for earth observation, mapping, and natural-resource monitoring. Broader in scope than IGN (covering hydrology, biology, hazards), but shares the sovereign mandate for national geographic and earth-observation data, including large open datasets.
- Esri: The dominant private GIS platform provider. Not a direct national-mapping peer, but the principal commercial counterpart in professional geospatial software; IGN's professional services and geoservices APIs overlap with parts of Esri's enterprise stack.
- HERE Technologies: Global location data and mapping platform serving automotive, logistics, and enterprise customers. Comparable in operating a large location data platform and APIs, though commercially focused and global rather than sovereign-public.
- TomTom: European-headquartered location technology company providing maps and navigation services. Comparable in geographic-data product portfolio but operates as a commercial, globally distributed private competitor to IGN's open-data, sovereign alternative.
Market position
Strengths5 records
Weaknesses5 records
Competitive moat6 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights7 records
Customer concentration
IGN social profiles
Digital presenceIGN financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
IGN leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles9 records
IGN funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds
Investors
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
IGN M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Frequently asked questions about IGN
What does IGN do?
IGN produces and disseminates sovereign geographic and forest information for France, operating the unified cartes.gouv.fr platform that provides free access to over 1,100 cartographic layers covering urban planning, cadastre, agriculture, forests, and energy. It builds and maintains national reference databases (BD TOPO, BD Forêt, LiDAR HD, OCS GE, BAN, RNB), develops proprietary AI foundation models (MAESTRO, CoSIA, GéoLLM) for automated cartographic production, and sells physical maps, custom prints, and aerial photographs through its boutique.
Is IGN a public or private company?
IGN is a private company. It is classified as state government owned and is currently operating.
When was IGN founded?
IGN was founded in 1940. It employs 1,001 to 5,000 people.
Where is IGN based?
IGN is headquartered in Saint-mandé, France, in the Europe region.
How does IGN make money?
Three revenue lines are on record. Government Public Funding is the primary driver. The others are map and Document Sales and professional Services and Data.
Who are IGN's main competitors?
Direct peers on record are Ordnance Survey, Bundesamt für Kartographie und Geodäsie (BKG), Lantmäteriet, Kadaster, Instituto Geográfico Nacional (Spain) and swisstopo. Broad incumbents are United States Geological Survey (USGS), Esri, HERE Technologies and TomTom.
Does IGN have an API?
Yes. IGN offers a Model Context Protocol (MCP) that allows AI assistants to connect to IGN geographic databases and query data in natural language. This enables users to cross-reference data and generate maps without requiring geomatics expertise. The MCP is available in beta test on GitHub. Additionally, IGN provides downloadable software tools including Circé v5 (coordinate conversion) and Comp3D (geodesy calculations), as well as web-based calculation services for GNSS and PPP processing. Developer documentation is at github.com/ignfab/geocontext.