Send Google maps to your “Beemer”
The Official Google Blog reports that BMW drivers in Germany can now send addresses from Google Maps directly to their BMW’s navigation system. This is one of many innovations that automakers and after-market equipment manufacturers are pioneering to make cars more “connected”. There is even a service that allows owners to track their vehicles via the web and set up alerts to be sent via email or text message.
We hope that this trend towards making vehicles more “wired” continues. Currently, vehicle navigation systems are very “closed loop” meaning that they cannot easily connect to computers and other devices to share data and maps. This is quite intentionally as manufacturers want to preserve their market share by forcing costumers to buy accessories and software from a single source.
We would like to see future navigation and vehicle management systems that are more like a table PC that can take software and components from different manufacturers and can connect to other devices via several networks, such as Bluetooth, WiFi, satellite and cellular networks. Such systems are already available but require significant effort to configure and don’t generally have look “factory”, which crowds vehicle interiors and makes devices harder to hide from prying eyes.
