GPS giant Garmin buys Navigon, navigation world gets smaller

Charting a new course for the company, GPS leader Garmin has completed its acquisition of Navigon, a smaller rival.

Garmin dominates in its U.S. home market, but it trails TomTom in Europe. Buying Navigon may help Garmin overseas, where the German-based company has operated since 1991.

Navigon became known in recent years for pioneering a free traffic information business model, along with graphic innovations such as reality view and lane assist. The company was delivering competitive, feature-rich portable navigators as the segment popularity skyrocketed a few years ago, then it withdrew to focus on smartphone applications. At the time, it seemed a stunning move, but the company predicted the shift away from devices and acknowledged the significant cost in competing with slim-margin hardware.

Garmin was slow to offer applications, stumbling through an effort to launch its own GPS-centric smartphone through AT&T, where it would be overshadowed by the Apple iPhone. Only this year has Garmin moved gingerly into the app world. Clearly, Navigon could aid the efforts there, as well.

Garmin will make a formal, detailed announcement in September regarding future plans. For now, a company spokesperson says that both Garmin and Navigon have developed product portfolios that will see them through the 2011 holiday season and into 2012.

Beyond that, we'll have to wait and see. Given Garmin's product track record and Navigon's innovation, we are quite interested to see what develops.

—Jeff Bartlett