Mio Technology is said to be gearing up to capture new customers in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the UAE after a contract with Almasa. The vendor is at present packing Mio’s products with Route 66 navigation software with the aim of alluring resellers operating in those markets. Sonia Chan, regional sales head at Mio Technology, said that their regional launch of GPS Navigator and PND products is a leading landmark for the firm’s Middle East business. Frank Sheu, CEO at Almasa believes the GCC map solution developed by Route 66 will prove a hit with Mio buyers, We saw months of extensive user testing and ongoing development in which engineers and technicians from Mio Technology, ROUTE 66 and Almasa had been involved. The result is an accurate, reliable and user friendly GCC map solution based on the most current data available for those countries. Subsequent to Mio’s deliverance to the region, Almasa is making out plans to present the similar bundles in Oman, Qatar and Bahrain in the Q2 of 2007. Mio’s products, the Mio A700, DigiWalker GPS PDA and Personal Navigation Device products will be availed in a package with Route 66′s Navigate 7 map solution. The software sports the most up-to-date maps, driving guidelines augmented with next-up exit signs and nonstop directions while GPS reception does not work for the time being via Route 66′s latest Extrapolated GPS technology.
ESA Starts Testing Satellite Navigation Service
The European Space Agency has begun testing its Satellite Navigation service – - the European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service ( EGNOS ) . EGNOS has been developed to make available vertical directions to pilots through arrivals and landings. The system is teamwork of the ESA, the European Commission and Eurocontrol . EGNOS, at present in pre-operational service , is to be verified and officially stated in 2008 for safety – of – life apps like air traffic control. The technology is claimed to develop on GPS performance by making available an exactitude of better than 7 fee t, likened with about 50 – 65 feet for the GPS. Plus , if a problem is found out with the system, an alarm is transmitted to the pilot. Likewise systems have been set up in the US , Japan and India , and those systems are claimed to be compatible and interoperable
Fine Digital Intro’s Finedrive M760, a Thin 7-inch PMP with GPS Navigation
Fine Digital recently surprised everyone with the introduction of its latest Finedrive M760 navigator with real-time TPEG traffic alerts for S.Korea. Well,everybody, in the blogsphere, reacted with hey, oh like exclamatory words, but I would present it in simple and sober manner, after all this is also one of the innovation of the state-of-the-art GPS technology. Any way let’s talk about the product now. The latest Finedrive M760 navigator is claimed to be the thinnest GPS Navigator with a 7-inch, 480 x 234, LED-backlit LCD display, plus a few DMB television has also been slapped in to up the distraction factor. More to the points, this is also featured with a tiny NIP (Navigation In Picture) not letting you take pain at looking the road again. The 25-mm (1-inch) slab is also built-in with an SD card and 800mA battery to take your MPEG-4, DivX, WMV video and MP3, WMA, and WAV audio with you once you reach your destination. If you reach your destination. You will have to cough up 440,000–almost $483–for the delight coming next month.
ALK CoPilot Live unites with N95
ALK Technologies recently announced the availability of an alternative to the N95′s on-board GPS software; CoPilot Live navigation is integrated with a pre-laden storage card for the handset. If you aren’t so eager on Nokia’s version, or came across the price tag of map downloads costly – this might be a viable option. Delivered via T-Mobile, Carphone Warehouse and O2, the CoPilot Live storage cards are previously laden with complete maps of the UK and Ireland from NAVTEQ. The maps consist of complete 7 digit UK postcodes and are literal down to house number and is included with thousands of points of interest (POIs). CoPilot Live makes the most of the N95′s integrated GPS receiver to help match up route whether by car or foot. It has also been developed to present an easy view for the traveller with maps merely being shown near to a turn or while prevented, with an easy graphical instruction displayed at all other times. Drivers are allowed to pick from optional views, comprising 3D, 2D or itinerary as needed. Merely extra charges could be in the CoPilot Live’s real-time location that needs a mobile data connection. Read
Qantas to utilize new accuracy landing system with GPS
The Qantas Group recently announced to roll out an innovative landing system, which is said to make use of satellite technology onto their planes, touting that the latest system is highly precise and also more and more recyclable. The GPS Landing System (GLS), designed by Boeing, Honeywell and AirServices Australia, has already been examined by the nationwide carrier. Captain Christ Manning, Qantas Chief Pilot said, The new system would be a more flexible system and when coupled with curved approach paths, would provide more fuel efficient and environmentally friendly flight paths to the runway. The system is supported by Ground-Based Augmentation Systems (GBAS) located at airfields, which provide GPS information to the aircraft via a datalink system and allow for a tracking accuracy typically less than one meter. The GPS system will make allowances for landing strip, which could not earlier have room for the traditional Instrument Landing Systems (ILS) to be more precise at the time of speaking approach paths. Captain Manning carries on stating that one GBAS endows with for about 90 approaches within a 23 nautical mile radius, not like usual Instrument Landing Systems, which need a deployment for each landing strip. Read
Maplin swaps in AYTOBE, a £100 GPS nav
The AytoBE GPS navigation system aims at bringing you much more bang for your well-earned money. For just £99.99, you are provided with a munificent (though standard) 3.5″ touchscreen display, MP3 playback potential, an SD memory card slot, TeleAtlas maps for the naive, and a battery life that goes up to three hours. The interface itself seems to be easy enough, and the built-in remote control makes sure backseat drivers consists of the power to distribute instructions using the AytoBE thanks to the extremely precise SiRFStar III GPS chipset and complete postcode search. Read
Mobile industry embraces GPS as their next target
Since GPS launched in 1978, it has been an essential aid to navigation all through the world. The world has become a remarkably small place, with people traveling nationally and internationally more often. The state-of-the-art technology has made consumers demand the capability of locating where they are, how to get to where they want to go and how to get the info they need when they get there. Satnav, GPS, location-based services – it’s boom time, and there’s a major opportunity here for mobile resellers. Considering navigation as one of the next major value-adding offerings, the cell phone industry is now targeting personal navigation device makers. There used to be a time when personal navigation device manufacturers such as Dutch TomTom would pooh-pooh feasible competition from the handset industry, but now with the passage of time and the booming aspect of the state-of-the-art GPS industry have made them realize the potential risk to their business. Even analysts are of the opinion that the annual market for phone navigation is worth hundreds of millions of euros. Last month when the world’s top handset maker Nokia rolled out its N95 with built-in navigation interface, the whole world of the news was hit with the headlines and other top vendors were also expected to follow soon, in hope of making 2007 the breakthrough year for mobile phone navigation. Nokia’s N95, with the price tag of $952, does not seem to be in reach of the masses notwithstanding first reports depicting strong sales, however the Finnish firm is still aimed at bringing GPS chips to a wide rang of its products. The GPS technology allows handset manufacturers to find a way around cell phone network operators and as a minimum a few of the navigation phones can be utilized for direction-finding while not linked to operators’ networks. Operators would find a share of the business while real-time data traffic begins to develop. Up to now it is the dream of the handset manufacture that people will make use of phones to pinpoint restaurants close by, however car navigation companies have before now begun offering road data. Read
Packard Bell unveils Compasseo 810 & Compasseo 830, its 2 latest GPS navigation system
Packard Bell recently announced to have integrated to its Compasseo lineup. The 810 and 830 are built-in with a 4-inch screen, half an inch more from the earlier models, the 500 and 600 and sport traffic info using RDS/TMC, a Premium service, which is claimed to provide you with traffic info in big cities. One more characteristic, which is built-in the 830 is the hands-free Bluetooth kit. Compasseo 810 will be rolled out with maps in a 1GB SD card of 1 GB and will just present basic ‘TMC Live’ traffic info. It can be availed at the ending of May for €299. Compasseo 830 is also integrated with maps however in a 2GB SD cardB and will make available ‘TMC Live Plus’ traffic info, which is touted to engulf all big cities like Paris. It can be availed in June with the price tag of just €449. (1) Software of navigation Destinator 6 with cartography Europe coming from Navteq (2) TFT LCD touch screen 65k colors and 480 272 resolution pixels (WQVGA) (3) Synchronization of contacts on the device with Outlook (4) Battery: Lithium-Ion with a 2-hour endurance (5) Integrated GPS SiRF Star III receiver (6) Movie player (AVI, WMV and MP4) (7) Movie player (AVI, WMV and MP4) (8) Samsung Processor at 400 MHz (9) Dimensions: 11.3 8.0 2.5 cm (10) Expansion slot: SD/MMC (11) Audio player (MP3) (12) 64 MB of RAM (13) Weight: 201 g Read
Fastrax soon to launch smallest OEM GPS receiver units with SiRF chipsets
Fastrax is very soon going to launch its latest iTrax310 and uPATCH300 OEM GPS receiver modules, which makes use of the robust SiRF chipsets. Available from GLYN High-Tech Distribution, Fastrax’s ultra small OEM GPS receiver modules supplies the SiRFstarIII receiver feature utilizing the low power SiRF GSC3f/LP chip. The unit has miniature form factor 13.1 x 15.9 mm, height is 2.5mm nominal (2.6mm max). The iTrax310 receiver makes available low power and the fastest TTFF plus weak signal acquisition and tracking potential to meet severe performance expectations. The module is compatible with pin to SEMCO GPD14B01007, and it can be availed with SiRF GSW3 firmware. The iTrax310 unit supplies comprehensive signal processing from antenna to serial data output in either NMEA messages or in SiRF binary protocol. There is also an availability of a second serial port for discrepancy corrections or for custom purposes. The unit needs a power supply VCC, a backing supply voltage VDD_RTC for non-volatile RTC & RAM blocks and GPS antenna input signal. The iTrax310 unit features to the customer’s app using two serial ports; two control signals, PPS timing signal and programmable GPIO signals. Read
u-Nav launches Hosted Orion RX2, a host-based GPS solution
u-Nav recently announced the launch of a host-based GPS solution called Hosted Orion RX2. The company says that the solution is not only simple to be integrated, but also aids in making available a cost optimized 20-channel GPS receiver getting industry sensitivity levels of -160dBm. The Hosted Orion RX2 solution, perfect for handy consumer devices, separates the navigation software between the uN3010 onboard DSP and host processor to competently make use of wherewithal from the host CPU, so reducing system price and board space. The Hosted Orion RX2 carries out navigation software at 1 Hz rate on the host CPU with no real-time stops, releasing the host CPU to help multimedia rigorous apps or wireless communique. All real-time GPS signal processing is completely held with the uN3010 single chip, consequently making available GPS measurement engine feature for a host-based solution. Founded on the uN3010 CMOS single chip GPS receiver, u-Nav’s Orion RX2 software is also claimed to give support to host mode GPS measurement engine configuration, usual NMEA GPS standalone mode, and cellular push-to-fix operation but for finding the middle ground for superb GPS performance. In standalone and hosted apps the u-Nav Orion RX2 software gets indistinguishable GPS performance. Read