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Smart driving: Something to TomTom about

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Preeti
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PUNE, INDIA: Most of us know the travails and fun of having a pillion driver. No one knows driving better than the person sitting in the back seat, as we must have discovered (or surrendered to) at some point with a resigned sigh on some road somewhere. From a ‘You should have taken that right turn I told about' to ‘why don't you change your gears now' to even a disgusting ‘come on now, don't be a coward, jump this red light'; we have endured some Mr.Mrs. Know-it-all often.

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So the idea of someone blaring out directions or instructions out of a microphone or a screen on the dashboard is not so alien after all. What is fascinating though is the number of crossroads that GPS majors have often encountered on this new tarmac of this navigation market. Most of them still struggle with either technology or ecosystem or user's real needs on the roads.

TomTom is a player here that is trying to mark a new lane of its own in this market, as the supplier of in-car location and navigation products and services. It claims it is focused on providing all drivers with the world's best navigation experience. With its headquarters in Amsterdam, TomTom claims it has its antennae set far and wide with products being sold in over 40 countries. In terms of diversity, this bonnet includes portable navigation devices, in-dash infotainment systems, fleet management solutions, maps and real-time services etc. We get to navigate some sharp turns and new stops with Arnout Desmet, Vice-President Content Operations, TomTom International on a chat drive to understand what's really (if anything at all) exciting about this market ahead. Hop in.

You started with a joint venture with Kalyani group in India. What's different about what you bring here or how you approach the customer's problems?

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The way we have developed map content has evolved over the years. Initially it was with aerial supply imaging or topical maps. We have covered a lot of road on many navigable attributes. We send our teams to field for nuances like speed constraints, traffic flows or turns etc, which are practical issues not possible to capture in an image.

Has mobile mapping been progressing as much you would wish it to?

Mobile mapping is a way of life in many countries. Cars drive around with camera units, scanners, GPS sensors to make fully-geo-informed choices available. It has grown to include exact location of signposts and bridges etc and so I would say we are highly-equipped today.

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Talking of such cars, we have seen lot of privacy brouhaha around cars like that of Google. What's your point of view? Is it a balancing act given the level of detail you want your solutions to provide?

Privacy is definitely a valid concern and we accept that. We use images for internal use and we strictly prohibit its exchange with other business users. We also make use of a lot of GPS info collected from users but that traces data anonymously as well as with consents. We take care of these issues with a high level of sensitivity. It's a challenge that we embrace while trying to provide as detailed maps as possible but with security sensitivity.

What new is possible with the way mapping can be used intelligently? Can it be tailored for segments like women or disaster emergency efforts?

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We do have specific ‘help me' buttons for emergency situations like police station or doctor locations as well as ways to track exact location of a vehicle. We have tried to embed a number of functionalities for emergency situations. In Europe, we cater to special needs of people driving camping cars to other countries for instance. We also cater to specific needs of logistics segment like restrictions of hazardous materials etc for truck drivers. As far as other disaster related needs go, I can relate to a hurricane example in America two years back. A lot of bridges were washed away that time and that's when this mapping technology helped our users by informing them of roads blocked ahead as well as incremental updates on dynamically-changing situations.

Can such technology work on Indian roads and driving-ways here, if you know what I mean?

Well, may be the market is not fully ready for advanced mapping yet, but we will definitely crack this market sooner or later. Yes, India has its own peculiarities and hence it needs localized solutions so we are excited about things like advanced navigation based on landmarks. It is an innovative offering that got started here and is now being deployed in other regions successfully as it gives really improved guidance. We achieved that by studying how Indians navigate differently. A lot of innovation will come out of India ahead also.

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Any automotive sector apps?

Many advances on driver assistance work are happening. At the same time it's about rich map interface with 3D display, visualization of landmarks, advanced lane-link guidance, more accurate instructions on intersections with visual display, street name info, voice-enabled navigation and local languages etc that we have started investing in.

Do your customers also help you in threading in their feedback and their mirror-views back?

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Yes, like Map updates have been incorporated via TomTom's MapShare crowd sourcing functionality in a recent deployment in Brazil, which enables users to report changes directly to TomTom for actioning, of which over 250,000 are reported every month. Here, combined with input from road-users via our MapShare programme, we are able to provide the assurance of a more secure, precise trip for drivers across the country.

Any recent deployments you want to mention?

We have pre-escorted a major sporting event in Brazil with our advanced Mobile Mapping (MoMa) technology that aims to provide road users with the most accurate maps of over 85,000 kilometres of the country's road network by early 2014. So far, over 10,000 kilometres of São Paulo state have already been driven by the MoMa car, identifying more than 17,000 changes to the map, ranging from new speed limits, lane changes to new toll roads or updates to road restrictions. Vehicles are equipped with state of the art technologies to capture unprecedented road network information, including HD 360-degree cameras, laser scanners and high-precision GPS.Your solution will stay unique in a very-well-inhabited market because?

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What differentiates us is advanced navigation content that we collect.

Special automatic maps for driver assistance and car scanners help us do that. We take everything under our scope - on-road speed restrictions, legal speed limits, gradient or slope information etc. So we have commercial solutions with partners also that cover anticipated adjustments of gearbox or transmissions and thus substantial fuel savings. Safety warnings and advanced notifications are also entailed.

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