Winning the Navteq Challenge 2010 Grand Prize with Wikitude Drive

By Philipp Breuss-Schneeweis, posted Feb 18th 2010 at 3:53PM

Mobile World Congress, Barcelona – February 17, 2010 – NAVTEQ awards Austrian-based Mobilizy GmbH (www.mobilizy.com) the Grand Prize for the Europe, Middle East, Africa (EMEA) edition of the 2010 NAVTEQ Global LBS Challenge® Wikitude Drive is the winning location based service (LBS) solution developed by Mobilizy which uses NAVTEQ® maps and offers an augmented reality camera mode and text-to-speech instructions, for turn-by-turn navigation. Mobilizy was the top winner over eleven other finalists who were each evaluated by a distinguished panel of judges comprised of executives from leading wireless and technology companies.

“We have seen mobile applications, and specifically, location-enabled solutions, play an increasingly important role with consumers and businesses,” expressed Jeff Mize, executive vice president, Global Sales, NAVTEQ. “The quality of judges and sponsors, who are a part of this year’s Global LBS Challenge, reinforces the interest in location-based solutions and we look forward to continued diversification of applications in the LBS space.”


wikitude drive - crossing golden gate bridge“Wikitude Drive is surely a prime example of disruptive technology. It is a light-weight navigation system which takes a different approach than all the other navigation systems: You see the real street on your mobile phone, instead of 2D or 3D maps.  Wikitude Drive integrates natively with our core product Wikitude World Browser, which gives you access to millions of POIs and your favorite travel guides like Lonely Planet, as well as gives Wikitude World Browser a link to a light-weight navigation system. There is a lot of room to grow in this area when you imagine the possibilities by having access to the huge number of mobile services and points of interest that are already available on mobile devices. Imagine driving by virtual bill boards of your favorite fast food chain, or simply having an alert when one of them is nearby. This is going to happen within Wikitude Drive. The Wikitude platform offers numerous opportunities for monetization. To mention only two: Wikitude Drive and Wikitude World Browser offer a fantastic base to sell premium content or to display location based ads.” – Philipp Breuss-Schneeweis, CEO of Mobilizy.

“Born out of our curiosity to see if the Wikitude framework would also work for navigation, it started as a shaky proof-of-concept and became a sincere example for disruptive technology. We won a once-in-a-lifetime prize, a check physically the size of towel, with a nice number printed on it. We are looking forward to working together with Navteq and Navteq’s partners in the coming months. The mission is to make the most out of this opportunity.” – Andreas Hauser, Wikitude Product Manager.

About the NAVTEQ Global LBS Challenge®

First launched in 2003, the NAVTEQ Global LBS Challenge is a worldwide competition conducted by NAVTEQ Network for Developers™ (NN4D), daring application developers around the world to build innovative location-based services (LBS) using dynamic positioning technology and NAVTEQ® maps. Integrating the accuracy and richness of NAVTEQ digital map data and LBS content facilitates the timely evolution of the next wave of location-aware applications. The Global LBS Challenge has become the premier event in the LBS industry for shining the spotlight on global LBS innovation and opportunity. Over 32% of the finalists from the past six years have gone on to receive venture capital funding or launch commercially-distributed applications. For more information on this year’s competition, go to www.LBSChallenge.com.

About NAVTEQ:

NAVTEQ is the leading global provider of digital map, traffic and location data that enables navigation and location-based platforms around the world. NAVTEQ supplies comprehensive digital map information to power automotive navigation systems, portable and wireless devices, Internet-based mapping applications and government and business solutions. The Chicago-based company was founded in 1985 and has approximately 4,400 employees located in 195 offices and in 44 countries.


About Mobilizy:

Mobilizy GmbH engages in the research and in-house development of location-based services and augmented (mixed) reality experiences for smart-phones. Mobilizy is one of the leading innovators in developing new methods and applications for data acquisition and exchange in the emerging market of augmented reality. Mobilizy is also an early pioneer in mobile augmented reality with it’s flagship product the Wikitude World Browser, available on Android, iPhone and Symbian platforms.
MEDIA CONTACT:

media@mobilizy.com
Mobilizy GmbH
Jakob-Haringer Str 5/IV
5020 Salzburg
Austria
Phone: +43 662 45 45 55 – 425

www.twitter.com/wikitude
http://facebook.com/wikitude


3 Responses to “Winning the Navteq Challenge 2010 Grand Prize with Wikitude Drive”

  1. Wikitude » Wikitude Drive Google I/O Update: Test Drivers Wanted says:
    20. May 2010 at 15:51

    [...] Grand Prize at the Navteq Challenge 2010 EMEA worth almost 600K € in cash and license fees (See Winning the Navteq Challenge 2010 Grand Prize with Wikitude Drive – The Inside Story). Wikitude/Mobilizy wins Grand Prize and Navteq Challenge [...]

  2. Wikitude » LP Optimus Hardcore Test says:
    26. July 2010 at 10:34

    [...] is a Augmented Reality navigation application we developed within the last year. It won us the Grand Price at the Navteq challenge for the EMEA region (also read: The Inside Story) – we are going to compete in the global final against the [...]

  3. Wolf Stubner says:
    12. November 2010 at 19:11

    ich lese immer nur tolle Sachen über Ihre Produkte, finde aber nirgends Hinweise, wie man einfach zu diesem Nutzen kommt:

    kann ich auf meiem Samsung Galaxy S I9000 das Wikitude drive laden, wenn ja, von wo? Habe zwar Wikitude World auf meinem Handy, finde aber z.Bs. für München und Hamburg keine “Worlds”, geschweige denn mal ein ausführliche Bedienungsanleitung.

    Wo kann ich mehr Informationen finden ?

    Besten Gruß aus Gräfelfing

    Wolf Stubner

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