Research In Motion, the Canadian manufactuer of the BlackBerry family of smartphones, has quietly acquired Dash Navigation, the US-based startup which was forced to change its business plans in November after its internet-connected GPS unit failed to attract a large enough user base. The deal was first reported by GPS Business News.
Dash, which was backed by Kleiner Perkins and Sequoia, pioneered the idea of a network connected personal navigation device that logged the position and speed of users and then fed users back real time traffic reports based on the data. While the concept, built into Dash’s first and only windscreen-mounted GPS unit, attracted considerable interest, its success was inevitably dependent on building a large enough user base.
Unfortunately Dash entered the market at a time when competition in the North American GPS navigation market between vendors like Garmin and TomTom was heating up. In the end Dash was forced to cut its staff dramatically and refocus on selling its software rather than hardware devices.
RIM has provided no details of the acquisition or its plans for the Dash business, other than to confirm the deal. However, GPS navigation is already built into most smartphones including most of the latest BlackBerrys. Some industry analysts believe that mobile phone-based GPS navigation will eventually replace dedicated GPS units and suggest this is why growth in market for PNDs is slowing.
Last year Nokia, the world’s largest mobile phone maker and a key competitor in the smartphone market, completed its acquisition of Navteq, the digital mapmaker, as part of the Finnish company’s strategy to expand location-based services in its handsets under the Ovi brand.
