Focus on Belgium: Why is Tele Atlas at the centre of a bidding war?

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Digital map maker Tele Atlas has become one of the best known Belgian IT companies of the moment, an certainly one of the best know in the Flanders region since sat nav hardware and software maker TomTom launched an audacious takeover bid for the business earlier this year.

Rival map maker Navteq has already succumbed to a $8.1 billion (£4 billion) bid from mobile phone maker Nokia. With the arrival of a counter bid from TomTom rival Garmin, and last night's announcement of a revised bid from TomTom and an increase in its stake in the business, many in the industry have begun to wonder why digital mapping has become such a popular sector.

Tele Atlas chief executive Alain De Taeye spoke to IT PRO as part of our Focus on Belgium, to talk about some of the trends and issues in the digital mapping market, and why the sector is garnering so much interest from other technology companies.

"Digital mapping has wide-ranging applications as part of so many other products, from portable GPS devices, to in-car satellite navigation and even online map services on the web," said De Taeye.

Tele Atlas has a large customer base beyond TomTom, with companies as diverse as BlackBerry maker RIM, Google, Via Michelin and Rand McNally.

"We make digital maps, and we licence that technology to other companies to power their applications and products,' added De Taeye. "We have created an infrastructure around digital map making that allows us to keep our map data current and as accurate as possible."

Tele Atlas doesn't have the feel of a traditional cartography specialist, but you soon realise the company has taken the technology into the digital age, with a fleet of vehicles around the globe patrolling streets and checking out locations where the company has received reports of changes to roads.

"Yes, we go out and survey streets as a matter of course, but we also provide online facilities for people and companies to report changes to maps, or add points of interest (POI) such as the location of a store or chain of stores, railway station or other location that may be of interest to our map users and customers."

However, the biggest attraction still comes from the automotive industry, where the potential for satellite navigation technology and positioning data has barely been tapped.

"The potential for navigation in cars is huge. Since the widespread adoption of GPS technology and improvements in map-matching technology have made in-car satellite navigation accessible and affordable, even integrated systems do not really integrate with the rest of the car's systems, such as its safety features," said De Taeye.

One example cited by De Taeye where navigation technology can have an overall impact on the operation of a vehicle is ADAS (Advanced Driver Assist System), a technology being fitted to some higher-end cars such as certain models of the Honda Accord. ADAS can interpret sat nav and mapping data to anticipate changing road conditions, such as sharp bends, and compensate accordingly (by engaging traction control for example), improving safety. ADAS is likely to become a major feature in forthcoming cars factory fitted with sat nav, and car makers will therefore become big customers for mapping technology, either on its own for use in bespoke systems or as part of a software set added to generic hardware. Either way it makes for a lucrative market.

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