TomTom Joins the OpenStreetMap Foundation As Its First Platinum Member (tomtom.com) 21
TomTom, the Dutch navigation software company most known for its GPS navigation systems, announced that it's support the OpenStreetMap Foundation (OSMF) as a Platinum Member. It's a U-turn for the company, which launched an article in 2012 on what they called the "negative aspects" of open data projects such as OpenStreetMap. From the press release: Last year, the geolocation company explained the instrumental role that OpenStreetMap (OSM) data is playing in its efforts to build the smartest map on the planet via the TomTom Maps Platform. Its latest move further affirms the company's commitment to the global OSM project. TomTom is contributing 20,000 euros to the OSMF as the first corporate OSM member to join the foundation at the Platinum level.
The OSMF is a not-for-profit organization that supports the OSM project in various ways, such as by running the OSM infrastructure and raising funds, as well as communicating with OSM working groups. With this annual contribution to the foundation, TomTom is providing direct financial support to OSM's operations and infrastructure, including hardware, cloud costs and engineering hours.
The OSMF is a not-for-profit organization that supports the OSM project in various ways, such as by running the OSM infrastructure and raising funds, as well as communicating with OSM working groups. With this annual contribution to the foundation, TomTom is providing direct financial support to OSM's operations and infrastructure, including hardware, cloud costs and engineering hours.
Re: Another platinum member? (Score:1)
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Is it a U-turn? (Score:2)
It doesn't really seem like that much of a U-turn. I'd be surprised if they don't still claim that they offer important value added services that offfer enhanced reliability etc.. over the open data.
But yes, I guess in an attitudinal sense it's a U-turn even if there's nothing inherently contradictory in thinking that there are places where open source content is lacking and helping improve that content. Though I admit it's pretty different when it's a company than when a coder goes from complaining about
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No. It appears to be a round-about. On closer inspection, it's an overpass. Or an intersection without left turn lanes.
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Does it really matter what it is? It's a company of zero significance to anything in mapping today trying to boost their image. Tom-Tom is Dead-Dead and of no use to pretty much anyone other than the 1% who won't touch Apple, Google, Microsoft or the myriad of other options that have made Tom-Tom 100% completely obsolete.
Re:Is it a U-turn? (Score:5, Informative)
Tom-Tom is Dead-Dead and of no use to pretty much anyone other than the 1% who won't touch Apple, Google, Microsoft
According to Wikipedia, TomTom is the primary supplier of Apple for their mapping service. It also became the supplier for Huawei after Google cut the ties. Also TomTom hardware comes included with certain car brands, so you pay their hardware and you probably get pressurized to take the subscription. It seems to me they have big customers and are not at immediate risk, although they need to take care of continuing their transition out of physical devices.
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Re:Is it a U-turn? (Score:4, Informative)
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Seriously? Most Bing imagery I've seen is far more out of date than Google's. It is as if they just made something that they could claim is a substitute for Google Maps without ever putting their heart and brains into it.
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Way more than 1%, for example Huawei has a market share of 4.6% and they use Petal Maps, which is based on Tom-Tom.
They still exist? (Score:3)
TomTom? I haven'[t seen a Tomtom product that was even remotely useful since about 2005. That ship has sailed for anyone that owns a cell phone and can use Carplay or Android Audo.
Best,
Re: They still exist? (Score:1)
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TomTom retreated from the consumer market, but they are still huge in the business market. As well as providing products to businesses like haulage, they provide map data for in-car sat navs. They also provide data to all sorts of other organizations, like civic planning, electricity/gas/water infrastructure etc.
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This is probably the only area where Google Maps/Apple Maps/etc fail and still remains a niche for standalone GPS units.
Truck GPS units are fairly expensive due to their specialized nature, and contain data that is not in the general map data so the companies behind that data has to manually survey the roads as well.
Basically a truck GPS takes an additional parameter when planning a route - the height of the truck - so it won't plan
Re:They still exist? (Score:4, Informative)
TomTom stopped selling GPS units a long while ago. They are however one of the two major global map providers, having bought Tele Atlas over a decade ago. (The other map provider is Navteq, which Nokia bought as part of its HERE maps).
Apple famously uses TomTom's maps for Apple Maps, and I believe Google primarily uses Navteq/HERE. Note that this is map coverage for areas they don't have their own mapping services for (both Google and Apple have their own teams for creating map data, but it's generally geographically limited so for the rest of the world, they license the maps from the other two companies).
So TomTom's still around, they're just more of a primary data provider now providing the data to Google and Apple and other map providers.
In Dr Evil voice: "20 Thousand Euros!" (Score:1)
If you can't destroy it from the outside... (Score:2)
... destroy it from the inside.
That appears to be standard industry practice when threatened by an open source project.
Call me ... (Score:2)
On second though, never mind. While the TomTom UI is OK, their hardware is garbage.