TeleAtlas - Map Insight Program HUGE step in making GPS Maps Right

Tele Atlas, announced it will expand its map update system with Map Insight, an online tool that allows users of Internet, personal navigation and wireless devices and applications powered by Tele Atlas data to quickly report changes to the company. Released in limited availability, Map Insight will be made generally available during the fourth quarter of 2006.

First Step in a Dream Come True Scenario
I have to say that this could be the first step in my dream – updated mapsets in real time. I’ve talked about this dream before, and wow, someone else is dreaming about this too!

So, TeleAtlas has been knocked, on this website too, for their out of date maps, but this is an excellent step in the right direction. It’s the first step in a chain that could nearly eliminate So, I complained that my street was not in the database when I first reviewed the TomTom GO 300 – at the time the street was >2 years old. When I was using the Mio C310 for a review, I stopped and talked to a TeleAtlas mapping manager one day, mentioned the issue and he said he’d map my street. I now went to this Map Insight and confirmed that they have my street available. Great! Now, if we can just shrink the time that it takes between TeleAtlas aware, and maps on my GPS, that would be nirvana. This Map Insight service will certainly help them get aware of what’s right and what’s not, making TeleAtlas a force to be reckoned with in the US. (Watch out NAVTEQ.)

Changes to roads and points of interest occur every day, and the ability to quickly analyze and incorporate multiple sources of input is vital to generating maps that are fresh and highly accurate. Tele Atlas already uses a combination of professional drivers, innovative mobile mapping van technology and other authoritative information sources to ensure that planned and existing changes are accurately incorporated into its maps. Map Insight adds an interactive, community-based perspective that Tele Atlas President and COO George Fink says is vital to the future of map development.

“Our goal is to produce the highest quality digital map data so that our partners can deliver the most useful information to local search and navigation system users. Advancements in technology make it possible for us to tap into the map community as a real source for detecting changes and enriching our maps,” said Fink. “As a result, users will get more out of their maps than ever before, and the industry will benefit as standards for delivering the most accurate digital maps rise.”

Mio Technology, one of Tele Atlas’ application partners and a leading supplier of a wide range of personal navigation devices, plans to offer the Map Insight tool on its own website. “This tool offers our end users a great opportunity to participate in building and improving the Tele Atlas map database. It also helps us to interact with our most dedicated customers,” said Paul Notteboom, Mio Technology Europe President. “It is a giant step forward in the development of the navigation industry, and underscores Tele Atlas’ continued commitment to the success of its partners.”

Tele Atlas’ digital map data is the foundation for many of the world’s leading local search and navigation systems. With Map Insight, users of these systems will be able to locate and describe situations where the mapping application does not reflect the real world and report them directly to Tele Atlas. The system will feature: