Navteq Using Velodyne Scanner

1. One of the most hyped news stories from the CES this week is Navteq’s True laser scanning system.
2. This is opening up the consumer market for laser scanning.
3. It is all based on the mobile platform – the place where the serious venture capital is being spent.

One of the most hyped news stories coming out of the CES – Consumer Electronics Show, this week is the announcement by Navteq that they are using laser scanning to construct 3D models and imagery of the US. This had been rumored for some time, but to me this is a very important announcement. It reminds me of the early days of GPS, when companies like Trimble refused to get into the consumer market. This kind of mass market use of 3D laser scanning has the potential to dramatically increase the demand for scanning.

Navteq is calling their laser scanning system “Navteq True”. It is clear to me, although I don’t see it in the press release, that this is the Velodyne-64 based on the unit’s description. Google has been collecting laser scanned data since 2008 for their Street View product. Microsoft announced in December that they will use the 3D Navteq imagery in their Bing Maps service.

I don’t completely understand how all of this 3D data is going to be served on mobile devices, but I would not bet against it. I recently heard that there are 4 billion cell phones and 1 billion land line phones – you do the math. Mobile apps are the hottest software game in the world, with serious venture capital being pumped into some of these projects. Add in the Google tablet, and the Android phones and you can see where the serious high tech venture money is going.

Hang on.