TomTom NV is one of the world’s largest navigation solution providers and is based in Amsterdam, Netherlands. TomTom’s products include both navigation hardware as well as navigation software. TomTom offers a wide range of portable navigation systems for automobiles, small personal computers, and mobile phones.

 

Its software solutions like TomTom Navigator and TomTom mobile help to convert small PCs and mobiles into GPS receivers which can be used as navigation systems like all-in-one navigation systems.   

The history of TomTom dates back to early nineteen nineties when two graduates of University of Amsterdam, Peter-Frans Pauwels and Pieter Geelen founded a company named Palmtop. They started to develop software solutions for the then popular hand-held computers which were in their formative years. After the successful completion of Psion series and developing applications in a limited circle, the company grew much faster and began to bring out new applications that became commercially success in the following years. The new applications including software for personal finance, dictionaries, games and maps etc slowly spread the popularity of the company worldwide and the company began to search new ways to market products in Europe and outside Europe.

 

Now the company added another partner -Corinne Vigreux. Still playing a huge role in hand-held market, the company introduced Palm Pilot in 1996 and it became an immediate success. As the Microsoft OS and related products started to flood in PC market, Palmtop developed applications which are compatible with Microsoft OS and this helped the company to increase its market share in the growing handheld market.

 

It was only after Harold Goddijn’s joining in the company, the name Palmtop was rechristened as TomTom. Harold Goddijn, the former Chief Executive of Psion thus became the fourth partner of the company in 2001 and also gave a new direction to the company. Infact, it was Harold Goddijn who gave the new name to the company. TomTom Navigator, the first mobile car satnav system was launched in the same year.

 

Nearly two years after the successful roll out TomTom Navigator, the upgraded version TomTom Navigator 2 hit the market in the early 2003. Meantime TomTom looked for experienced, efficient people to guide its technical personnel as well as marketing team. As a part of the company’s strategic plans, Mark Gretton, former CTO of Psion was offered the position to lead the hardware team while Alexander Ribbink, a former top marketing official in Mars Incorporated shouldered the responsibility of finding new ways to increase the sales of new products of the company.

 

In the early 2004, TomTom launched its all-in-one in-car navigation system TomTom Go which works straight out of the box. It had an easy-to-use touch screen with intuitive, friendly interface and much more useful features. After a few months in the same year, TomTom Mobile was launched. It was a car navigation system, but was made available on a smartphone.

 

TomTom’s products provide navigation solutions that include all-in-one navigation devices, portable devices and navigation software. Following are the products of TomTom:

 

 

TomTom Go and TomTom One offer various range of all-in-one automobile navigation systems. TomTom Rider is a portable bike navigation device especially designed for motorcycles.  TomTom Navigator is navigation software that you can use in your handheld computers or small PCs. TomTom Mobile offers navigation software that will convert your mobile to a GPS receiver. Apart from these products, TomTom offers navigation software that can be used in non-TomTom satnav systems.

 

TomTom navigation units usually have user-friendly touch-sensitive LCD screen interface that offers two types of views – bird’s eye view and plain overhead view. The in-built GPS receiver helps the device to determine the accurate location over the map and offers visual guidance and clear spoken instructions in a chosen language to reach the preferred destination.

 

Some of the TomTom units come with Bluetooth technology which enables them to load congestion maps over the mobile phones or send and receive text messages via your mobile phones.

TomTom Plus, a service which you can get for certain fee provides such information like the alerts over speed cameras in the traffic, weather updates and essential traffic alerts.

 

 

TomTom Go car navigation system offers in-car navigation units like

 

TomTom One models include

 

 

TomTom Go series come with 4” touch sensitive LCD screen that enables you to give your instructions just by using your finger tips. All the models can deliver clear, spoken instructions in 36 languages. They provide you 1000 Points of Interests (POI) that include restaurant, petrol station, car park or cinema halls. There is also an option of downloading additional 1000 POI of your choice. You can also avail of traffic information which is precise, up-to-minute and provides you jam alerts and road condition alerts while you are driving. TomTom Go units come with detailed maps of your region and the important roads of Europe pre-installed on a SD card to enable you make door-to-door navigation across your region as well as cross border navigation to any town in Europe. With TomTom Go unit, you can plan your route to make it quicker, shorter by avoiding busy roads and traffic congestions. All TomTom Go series car navigation systems come with built-in mp3 player or iPod, however the latest TomTom Go 910 has an additional 20 GB hard disk for storing lots of songs, pictures, videos and maps.

 

TomTom Rider is a series of portable models which are designed and developed especially for bikers. They come with an integrated GPS receiver that can be mounted on any bike and a wireless headset inside the helmet delivers high quality sound instructions.

 

TomTom Rider offers bike navigation systems that include:

 

 

Both the models come with 3.5” touch sensitive LCD screen and basic functionalities like GPS receiver with 20 channel tracking, Bluetooth headset, SD memory card and USB port etc.

 

TomTom Rider Europe provides door-to-door navigation throughout the whole of Western Europe. Its in-built 1 GB SD card contains all the latest and accurate NAVTEQ maps as one single map enabling you to find any address in Western Europe.

 

TomTom Rider Regional provides door-to-door navigation in your region or country. For example, a TomTom Rider for UK region will cover 99 percent of UK and cater all your navigation needs. These models are relatively cheaper than TomTom Rider Europe models.

 

Like typical automobile navigation systems, TomTom Rider models have user-friendly interfaces in most European languages as well as deliver clear, spoken instructions in 36 languages. The TFT screen displays maps and both the 3D bird’s-eye view and the plain 2D view of your route.

 

TomTom Rider models come with thousands of pre-installed Points of Interests (POI) that help you to locate petrol stations or restaurants or cinemas or any places of importance. With the help of information provided by your bike navigation systems, you can plan your route to make it quicker, shorter by avoiding busy roads and traffic congestions. You can even program the schedule of places you intend to visit and set up an itinerary in advance.  

 

TomTom provides navigation software and maps that you can use directly from any PDA’s address book or pocket PC’s or from mobile like HP iPAQ hw6915.

 

TomTom Navigator 6 is navigation software that can be easily installed on any compatible PDAs and mobiles that include some of the models of Sony Ericsson, Acer, Dell, HP, and Nokia etc. It is usually installed along with TomTom Home which provides up-to-date maps and other navigation information.

 

TomTom’s navigation software products are available on DVDs or SD memory cards which come either as stand-alone or with a GPS receiver.

 

TomTom Navigator 6 integrated into HP iPAQ hw 915 mobile can be used as an all-in-one navigation system. It has all basic navigation functionalities and can be used when you navigate by car, bike or even on foot.