Looks like TomTom, Garmin and other companies which offer navigation services by subscription are going to have a hard time keeping up with Google’s latest offering to its Android users – Google Maps Navigation (Beta) – an internet-connected GPS navigation system that provides turn-by-turn voice guidance, live traffic updates and the ability to recognize voice commands as a free feature of Google Maps on
Android 2.0 phones (currently only the Droid from Verizon comes with 2.0).
Alright, we missed one word in the lines above; it will come “FREE” of cost. Google said that the service might be supported by advertisements in the future which would help make GPS navigation from being a paid service to one that is free but ad-supported.
Eric E. Schmidt, Google’s CEO, said it is a boon to consumers, made possible by the increasing power of smartphones and the growing ubiquity of Internet access.
“Obviously we like the price of free, because consumers like that as well,” he added.
As the NYT reports, Google executives said they eventually hoped to offer the service on Apple’s iPhone and other mobile devices. But they said this would be up to those device makers.
Will Apple really team up with Google now, after their long battle to get the Google Voice App for iPhone approved in the App Store?
OK, you just want to watch the video right? Here it is.
See what’s happening to GPS navigation companies such as Garmin And TomTom’s share prices already:
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Amazing…. now when can we have it for the rest of the world?
Now only if we would know about it!
Google is on top of it!
Oh my God! I can’t believe it! The guys at Google are just… AMAZING! I am so getting the Droid!
I’m ready to pay money to have this on my iPhone. Hopefully we don’t have to wait too long!
We guess this time Google is going to make Apple beg for it as Apple didn’t behave well with them for the Google Voice App.
How will these features handle inaccurate GPS locations. I use the BlackBerry Pearl and it used the cell towers to get my location, sometimes within a radios of half a mile. Will Android phones have a true GPS system?
This application will use the handset’s GPS data after receiving data from the A-GPS (cellphone-tower based location) so you wouldn’t have a problem regarding this we guess.