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Navigating in 3D coming in 2006
Monday January 30, 2006 - Map supplier TeleAtlas plans on shipping 3D map data of large European and American cities by the end of 2006.
By the end of 2006, TeleAtlas, supplier of the maps on most of TomTom's products, is planning on shipping realistic three-dimensional maps of large European and American cities.
At the Independent Blackberry User summit held at the Hilton in Amsterdam last Thursday, Leon van de Pas, TeleAtlas' salesmanager Europe, claimed that the conversion from 2D to 3D maps is the most important development in 2006. "We use six camera's on all our map-data-collecting mobilhomes, and we also measure the height of the buildings with a gyroscope. Before the end of the year, we'll add 3D environments of large European cities to our maps." In this 3D mode, images are projected on the buildings in the cities, so the mapping experience become extremely realistic. Hundreds of employees in India are currently busy inputting the images into databases. The technology that is used for this project is called "mobile mapping", and was developed by Polish based GeoInvent, a company that was bought by TeleAtlas last year.
But not only buildings will get a recognisable face. Also POI's are thought of. For this, TeleAtlas is combining their efforts with 3000 suppliers of POI data.
Dates
Eventhough the 3D maps should be available by the end of the year, little is known about which Personal Navigation Device supplier will be the first to bring a product that supports this technology to the market.
Van de Pas doesn't believe that PDA's will be suited for such a task since he thinks that only dedicated devices will have the necessary horsepower aboard. "Dedicated GPS chipsets have to be incorporated into the devices". He also claims that PDA still can't compete with the easy of use that a TomTom GO is currently providing. "A Blackberry is more suited for business use. The fact that it also runs navigational software is only a nice bonus".