How Google Maps Made The Navigation Industry “Sweat”
The arrival of contemporary smartphones and mobile apps in the late 2000s didn't just fundamentally change what consumers expect from their handsets, it also ended up disrupting a wide variety of industries, with mobile navigation being its first target. Founded in 1999, Santa Clara, California-based Telenav was enjoying a relatively successful first decade of existence, having worked with major U.S. carriers such as AT&T and Sprint on offering navigation services. Following the arrival of Google Maps, it suddenly found itself having to rethink its flagship product after after Google's solution, offering a comparable navigation service free of charge, became available on every new smartphone. "It made the industry sweat quite a bit at the time," Telenav Executive Director of Strategy Ky Tang recalled in an interview with Android Headlines, asserting Google Maps had changed the navigation game significantly. At a time when smartphones were enjoying massive globa...
