Navigation devices take center place at Cebit

Among all the new features the manufacturers of GPS receivers introduced at Cebit this year, one thing they haven’t cracked yet is how to navigate around the myriad halls and alleys of the trade show, which sprawls over 240,000 square meters of exhibition space. With the reorganization of the show this year, and the closure of Hall 1 for refurbishment, getting lost can be a serious problem even for seasoned show-goers.

Navigation devices, though, have found their way out of the shadows: 10 million were sold in 2007, according to distributor Ingram. This year they are in center place at Cebit, with Hall 15 dedicated to GPS receivers and related fleet management software.

Manufacturers presented devices that offer a number of new functions, including more realistic illustrations of the road ahead, and better advice on which lane to take when approaching complex intersections.

In new devices unveiled at Cebit this week, Navigon and TomTom overlay colored arrows or lines on a perspective view of the intersection ahead to indicate lanes that lead in the correct direction. Drivers also see onscreen representations of the actual road signs to follow as an additional cue.

While other software developers are trying to fulfill the same needs of drivers, some are struggling with usability. To indicate the best lane to use, Sygic shows a series of small arrows tucked into the corner of the map view, colored green for the correct lane and white for others. Under the exhibition hall lights, it was not easy to distinguish the lights at a glance — especially on the small display of a mobile phone. Sygic’s software can be installed on phones with GPS running the Symbian or Windows Mobile operating systems, and is also available in GPS receivers from Freesat, Soundmax, and Themap and multimedia players from Archos.

Mapfactor, from Prague, also highlighted the road signs drivers should follow, but indicated bad lane choices by tiny red dots on a small grid beneath the map view, which were hard to pick out at a glance. Mapfactor sells the Actis 3 and Actis 4 GPS receivers, and also offers its Navigator software for PCs and PDAs. Version 8, demonstrated running on an OQO ultramobile PC, will go on sale in a couple of months, staff said.

Three-dimensional representations of buildings are also starting to appear — but although the necessary map data is widely available, devices with the memory capacity to hold it are not, according to a spokesman from Horizon Navigation. The maps require more than 2GB of memory, which is the limit in many devices on the market, he said. The company demonstrated Version 4 of its NavMate software, which will soon be released. Horizon is looking for device manufacturers to adopt it.

One of the most intriguing gadgets discussed at the show was Garmin’s Nüvifon, a tiny touch-sensitive tablet that is both phone and navigation device. It will display driving routes and let you surf the Internet or type text messages using an on-screen qwerty keyboard — although not all at the same time, Garmin said. The company only had nonfunctioning mock-ups on display at its stand — the same size and weight as a working product, a representative helpfully said — so it will be a while before this one is ready to challenge the iPhone. Garmin hopes the Nüvifon will find its way to market in the third quarter.

GPS devices aren’t all about the display, however; some are designed not to be seen. That’s the case with the Locator from Portuguese company Inosat Consultoria Informatica. It has a battery life of up to 30 days, the company said, and transmits its location periodically, allowing you to track your “loved ones” via a Web site, Inosat said. Other companies exhibiting similar new products from Laipac Technology of Canada and Algodue of Italy. Algodue also makes waterproof trackers if your loved one is a keen swimmer.

One expensive asset that many would like to track is the second Galileo satellite, Giove B, the launch of which has been delayed to next month. Galileo is a European Union project to complement the U.S.-owned GPS: Using signals from the GPS and Galileo satellite constellations together should make navigation devices more accurate. Swiss company U-blox tried to demonstrate its chips capable of receiving signals from both constellations, but show-goers had to wait patiently for Giove A, launched in 2005, to pass overhead to see the Galileo part of the demonstration. Giove A orbits about once every 14 hours, and is visible for only a few hours at a stretch.

(With additional reporting by Jeremy Kirk and Nick Barber in Hanover.)