We are hearing reports this morning that Nokia [NOK] are going to soon be offereing free navigation to smartphone users around the globe.

When Google announced Google Maps Navigation financial trackers saw drops in both TomTom and Garmins shares with in the space of hours and Maps Navigation only covers the US with a relatively small user base. With Nokia though, they are going to be allowing free navigation to users across the globe in 74 countries across 46 languages which will cover about 20 million smart phones.

The one thing that navigation makers like TomTom [TOM2] and Garmin [GRMN] do have that Google Maps Navigation and Nokia Navigation won’t have is the ability to be used off line See Update below. Free services tend to use real time data to create routes and if there is no signal on your phone then you wont get a route unlike TomTom and Garmin where you can plan a route anywhere due to maps being stored locally.

There isn’t much news about this just yet although with it being released over at Reuters I am sure we’ll here something soon. Check out Google Finance to keep track of stock.

Update: We are now hearing that Nokia Navigation will be an off line service meaning that my concerns mentioned about having to have a signal are not important here.

Update 2: You can download it now over here.

Via: Engadget

Nokia to Offer Free Navigation on Smartphones

Rather than mongering yet another rumor, DigiTimes is apparently reporting as fact that an Ion 2-powered Eee PC will launch in April. It's also expected to host a 12-inch display if we're reading this report correctly. That NVIDIA boost is welcome news since the Pine Trail-only bump given to its Eee PC 1005PE didn't offer much in the way of performance improvements and still can't handle YouTube video in HD. While no direct prices were given, Atom N450-based Eees are expected to drop in price to NT$14,000 (about $439) in Q2 after ASUS depletes its stock of legacy N270- and N280-based Atom netbooks. DigiTimes also notes that its 10-inch Eee PC T101 convertible touchscreen tablet (the T101MT presumably) will launch in late February along with a 12-inch Eee PC built around AMD's Congo.

ASUS' Ion 2-based Eee PC to launch in April originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 21 Jan 2010 02:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  DigiTimes  | Email this | Comments