GPS Stand-alone Or GPS Cell Phone — Which Will Win?

Stand-alone GPS systems face challenge

BY ERIC BENDEROFF

Chicago Tribune

As I watched an ad for GPS gadget maker Garmin Ltd. during the recent Super Bowl, I had a fleeting thought the $2 million spent would be a waste, just like all that money those long-gone dot-coms once spent on the big game.

Last week, as I read about a parade of mobile phone-based navigation debuts at a European trade show, that thought turned into pessimism for Garmin, Tom Tom, Chicago’s Cobra Electronics and other makers of stand-alone global positioning systems.

There is no doubt that GPS devices are getting to be a big market. They are handy and they work, getting you from your front door to the latest trendy restaurant in an unfamiliar neighborhood.

But the future is in the palm of your hand, not on the dashboard of your car…. Read the rest of Eric’s GPS Challenge” article here:

A good thought piece from Eric Benderoff here. I was particularly interested in the market scope/adopting figures quoted by Robert Gourdine the marketing Director for Navteq who make the maps for a large percentage of both the GPS phones and the stand-alone GPS devices out there. Only about 2% of the market has of yet taken up … 98% of the US car market is a huge opportunity to be sure.

It’s a big enough opportunity that companies who “get it” are remaking themselves to not only stay alive but grow substantially. Remember CB radio? Remember Cobra who was one of the biggest in that bubble. Well Cobra is now positioned as a hot producer of GPS gizmos … a good read of the market in my view.

But what about the stand alone versus cell phone GPS question? I don’t presume to have the total answer but here’s some thoughts if you are thinking of purchasing or investing:

Stand-alone GPS Pros:

• For the foreseeable future … that is the life cycle of what people buy today, 3 years or so, the accuracy of stand alone devices can not be beat. There are a lot of actual crap GPS trinkets ion the market today and in the long run, accuracy isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.
• Much easier to provide readable displays and decent maps. Cell phone real estate is just too limited for easy map use, especially if you want to see the map while driving.
• Easier for OEMs to integrate. There are already some car stereo mashups … satellite radio, trip computers, on board diagnostics, etc. The don’t scale well with the typical cell platform.

Cell-based GPS Pros:

• It’s always with you … navigation is more than car navigation
• It’s cheap. And going to be cheaper.
• Because (as Eric’s article correctly points out) the Federal Mandate for phone location does not “require” GPS. So the various carriers may have tower-based location available as a substitute or adjunct to GPS location when GPS signals aren’t giving a good navigation solution.

Which would Mr. GPS buy at this time in the market? Both. as long as a manufacturer or team of manufactures would Bluetooth the hand held and the car unit like an iPAQ autosync so I wouldn’t have to enter and re-enter data.

What would you buy?