Slashgeo

The Map Room links to an article that profiles NAVTEQ. From the article: "More than 100 companies and government agencies use NAVTEQ, including MapQuest, Google, Yahoo!, Garmin, Tom Tom, Magellan, Motorola and Verizon. Chances are if you've ever needed a map online, in the car, or on your cellphone, you've used NAVTEQ's data. The company is so large it's practically the Microsoft of navigation data, and it's still growing. Its second-quarter revenue was up 30 percent to $159.9 million, and profit nearly doubled, to $30.2 million."

In case the news hasn't reached you guys yet, Nokia is in talks to purchase NAVTEQ. I heard it from a 3rd party source, but it seems like it's shaking things up a bit (for them at least). A quick google search reveals some news activity today about it: read more on Bloomberg and Trading Markets. Update: 10/01 20:03 GMT by S : APB discuss the impact of the deal on Garmin. Slashdot discuss the acquisition. Expect more analysis from various medias in the coming days.

As expected, the Nokia acquisition of NAVTEQ made ink flow. I'm to blame for not having linked to the official press release in my previous coverage. Amongst the reactions, here's Vector One short analysis, GeoCarta discuss how this acquisition could mean trouble for Garmin, and then there's All Points Blog extensive coverage: links to many media reactions, link to why Nokia should now buy Skype, link to why Google never considered buying NAVTEQ themselves and the impact on the price paid by TomTom for TeleAtlas.

A few geoblogs highlighted Garmin's withdrawal from the Tele Atlas acquisition bid and the long term agreement between Garmin and NAVTEQ (owned by Nokia). The Map Room links to a short Engaget story and APB to an article on the withdrawal. All Points Blog provides a few additional links on the settlement of Garmin with TomTom regarding intellectual property cases. The agreement's introduction: "NAVTEQ (NYSE: NVT), a leading global provider of digital maps for vehicle navigation and location-based solutions and Garmin Ltd. (Nasdaq: GRMN), today announced the completion of a long-term agreement that provides Garmin access to NAVTEQ map data through 2015 with an option to continue through 2019." See also related stories below.

The Map Room links to a Wall Street Journal article on the digital roads duopoly between NAVTEQ and TeleAtlas. From the article: "Neither bid could be justified by the financial performance of the companies -- Navteq is modestly profitable while Tele Atlas is losing money -- but analysts say the buyers were willing to pay a "strategic premium" because of the value of mapping data to all players in the GPS industry. Now investors and regulators are raising questions about the implications of the two deals." See also related stories below.

A number of financial and industry sites are reporting on the dip (Ref 1, Ref 2) in stock prices for some of the leading portable navigation device manufacturers. Following an earnings warning on 4/8 and some earnings concerns quarter-to-quarter for Garmin, prices have been on an overall steady decline. Add to this the price concerns for TeleAtlas and NAVTEQ, each with their own merger concerns in the EU, and things don't look good in the short term for a portfolio focused on portable nav devices.

Nothing an approval from the EU regulators couldn't fix!

Adam Grabowski writes "Recently Mike Frey, NAVTEQ Principal Architect became involved in representing NAVTEQ on the JSR 293 Location API 2.0 expert group. JSR 293 is the follow-up to the JSR 179 Location API for Java 2 Micro Edition (J2ME) proposed by Nokia in 2002 and released in September 2003. JSR 293 adds services for geocoding, navigation and map display, filling out the suite of services needed to develop location-based applications on a mobile device. It increases the number of Java classes and interfaces from 13 to 40. Participating on the JSR 293 Location API 2.0 expert group is exciting because of the opportunity to contribute to the development of a standard that will enable Java applications to run with little or no change on many different mobile devices and carriers. Download the article here — http://developer.navteq.com/getDocument.do?docId=3119. Note, requires a NN4D login." Editor's note: we're working on giving direct access to these documents to Slashgeo registered members without the need of a separate NN4D account. This feature may however not be available until late next fall.

NAVTEQ today announced that MapQuest, has expanded its agreement with NAVTEQ. Under the new agreement, MapQuest now has access to all 73 countries in the NAVTEQ map database, as well as future country releases. MapQuest will utilize NAVTEQ data in both its Internet and mobile applications.

You can read the entire announcement at GISCafe.