Cool-er eReaders Sign D&H

The Cool-er eReader is now likely to broaden its U.S. distribution beyond QVC with a new agreement with D&H Distributing Co.

U.K.-based Interead, maker of the flashy Cool-er eReaders , appointed D&H to act as its distributor for the  North American market.

The Cool-er, first launched in May in the U.S. last year, attracting attention as a trendy, low priced eReader (at the time) at $249.

At the Consumer Electronics Show in January, Interead, which enjoys wider distribution in Europe,  announced several new Cool-er models due this spring, including the company’s first WiFi model and a new compact-sized eReader.  They come in numerous colors such as “midnight blue” and “orange crush.” Also a 3G model is possible in late summer, said the company in January.

The Cool-er Compact claims to have the smallest footprint of any eReader, measuring 6.7 by 4.6 inches and less than a half inch thick.  It has a 6-inch E Ink screen with 2GB of onboard memory and SD card slot at an expected price of $199.

The Cool-er Connect offers WiFi and a touch screen and weighs a low 5.8 ounces at a target price of $249.

iPhone OS Could End Up on Web-TV Boxes and Other Phones

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Sub $129 eReader from Nextar

General merchandise stores may soon be selling eReaders as Nextar, which caters to stores such as K Mart, Target, and Kohl’s, plans to offer three budget priced eReaders starting in the third quarter.
Nextar plans to ship a low end model with a 7-inch color LCD priced under $129 without WiFi or 3G, which sideloads eBooks from a PC. The device is expected to have an 8- to-10 hour battery life.
Second in the lineup is a similar model, also with 7-inch color screen, that adds WiFi, and a third model will sport a 6-inch E Ink screen with a longer battery life.
Nextar says eReaders are a strong fit with its retail base, which also includes Belk and Bon Ton. The company has also sold GPS devices into drug store chains and supermarkets. Nextar said it is lining up an eBook store to support its devices.

Sirius Expects New Service Plans

Sirius XM, which seems to have successfully clawed its way back from the brink of extinction, said it expects to offer new, additional services and pricing plans in the future, but gave no details.
A very upbeat Sirius XM CEO MEl Karmazin announced Sirius XM added a total of 250,000 net new subscribers for the full year 2009 and plans to add another 500,000 in 2010.
Almost all of the net new subscribers, however, are coming from new and used car owners rather than retail shoppers, said the company, which now has 18.8 million subscribers.
A total of a million subscribers are now paying for the more expensive “Best of Both” plans, said Sirius.
Karmazin noted on a conference call Thursday, that Sirius XM is permitted to raise prices on service plans as of August 2011, according to FCC rules, although there are no plans now to do so.
About 25 million cars on the road now have Sirius or XM radios with about 11 million of those activated and so the used car market is expected to become an important contributor to new subscribers in the next few years as cars with Sirius XM radios pass to second owners. This segment will replace the retail aftermarket as a key source of subscribers, said Karmazin.
Less than half of Sirius XM subscribers now come from retail (7.7 million retail v 8.9 million OEM). The satellite radio service lost 200,000 net new retail subscribers for the quarter ended December 31, 2009 and lost 1.2 million during the full year 2009. It added 442,000 OEM subscribers for the quarter and added 935,000 net OEM subscribers for the year.
If you are wondering whether Howard Stern will continue on Sirius, you’ll have to keep wondering. Karmazin said only that Stern “has done his best work” during the past four years at Sirius, and noted, “There’s nothing in his contract that deals with the time frame of when we need to negotiate to do a deal. So we have nothing to announce today. My suggestions is, for those who are interested…to tune to Howard 100 because we will be providing you regular updates.”
Recent good news for the company is that its stock has been trading above $1 per share for the past six days so it may end up complying with NASDAQ rules, requiring trading at least 10 days above $1, so it won’t have to face either de-listing or a reverse stock split. Even if the stock does miss the 10-day requirement, Sirius will apply for a six-month extension to the NASDAQ and it plans to avoid a reverse stock split, said Karmazin.
For the fourth quarter, Sirius revenues rose 6.2 percent to $683million, up from $644 million a year ago with the average customer paying $10.92 per month. The company earned $14.2 million during the quarter compared to a loss of $246 million a year ago.

Source: Sirius XM
Photo: Sirius XM CEO Mel Karmazin, via Reuters

10 Billionth Song Downloaded on iTunes

Apple’s website announced this milestone with a listing of the most popular songs on iTunes of all time (Frank Sinatra is not on the list).

Source: Apple via Engadget

Nintendo DSi XL to Launch March 28

Nintendo set a launch date for its newest DSi handheld game machine with a larger screen, called the DSi XL. Due for release on March 28 at $189.99, the device includes dual screens that are 93 percent larger than those of the Nintendo DS Lite, and that have a wider viewing angle.
Nintendo said Wednesday in a press statement that the DSi XL will be available in the colors of burgundy and bronze and it ships with a larger stylus.
The handheld is pre-installed with software including Brain Age Express: Arts & Letters, Brain Age Express: Math and Photo Clock, and two free apps: the Nintendo DSi Browser and Flipnote Studio.
New titles for the DSi XL also include America’s Test Kitchen: Let’s Get Cooking and WarioWare: D.I.Y. and will launch simultaneously with the handheld.
The DS platform is also now an eReader so to speak, as a new title—“100 Classic Books”– will release on June 14 for all DS models at $19.99. It is the first book title for the DS in the U.S. (although similar titles have sold overseas) and it includes 100 works from authors such as William Shakespeare, Jules Verne, Jane Austen, and Mark Twain and more. Readers can adjust the size of the text, place bookmarks and download new content via the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection service.
Other new DSi and Wii titles were also announced by Nintendo Wednesday.

Source: Nintendo

Garmin Beats Expectations, Will Push Fitness

Garmin fared better than expected in its results for the fourth quarter ended December 26, 2009, with revenue and earnings up due to solid gains in fitness GPS products, and stabilizing in the portable GPS market.
Total revenue gained 1 percent to $1.059 billion and net income rose to $278.4 million, up from $157.7 in the quarter a year ago.
But auto/mobile GPS revenues saw a slight decline of 2 percent for the quarter y/y to $812 million and much of the growth this year for Garmin will be in non-PND products, especially outdoor/fitness products which saw revenues gain 24 percent for the quarter to $149 million.
Garmin chairman and CEO Dr. Min Kao said the company will expand distribution of fitness products to new retailers. Kao admitted that that the portable navigation device (PND) market is maturing and therefore Garmin is predicting flat to slight declines in revenues for PNDs in 2010. Unit sales are still growing in North America, and in emerging markets such as Eastern Europe, Asia and Latin America, while declining in Europe, so overall unit sales in 2010 should be flat to slightly up.
Kao also admitted Garmin was disappointed by sales of the nuvifone GPS/smartphones to date, but said the new smartphones planned for the first half this year will be better positioned competitively. The new Android based A50 nuvifone and Windows Mobile based M10 received a good reception from mobile carriers and retailers and the recent Mobile World Congress show, said Garmin.
Garmin now has a 60 percent PND share in the U.S. and a 20 percent share in Europe. It shipped 6.6 million PNDs in the fourth quarter, up 3 percent. PND average selling prices (ASPs) declined 6 percent in the quarter, slowing nicely from the full year 2009 decline of 18 percent. For 2010, ASPs for portable navi should fall by 10 percent, reaching $139, Garmin predicted.
While PND sales are maturing, Garmin says there are opportunities to boost sales in North America through advances in PND form factors and features such as connectivity as well as in OEM auto GPS.
Like TomTom, Garmin says that smartphones have not yet had a significant impact on PND sales.
The company noted research firm Canalys is predicting the total global PND market will grow slightly from 39 million in 2010 to 39.5 million.
Outdoor/fitness GPS revenues for the full year 2009 grew 10 percent to $469 million. Outdoor products such as the Dakota series will be stable while fitness products should drive the growth so the full category could see revenues increase 5 to 10 percent for the year. Revenues are also expected to increase by the same margin in aviation and marine GPS, said Garmin.

Source: Garmin

Intel Huron River Notebook Platform in 2011

Intel is expected to announce early next year a new Huron River notebook platform preceded by new desktop CPUs to be unveiled later this year, says DigiTimes.
Source: DigiTimes

Smartbooks to Hit 163M in 2015

As shown in Apple’s iPad, new devices that sandwich themselves between a smartphone and a netbook are on the rise.
As a class, they are called “smartbooks” and they should see shipments soar to 163 million units by 2015, marking a quick ascension, as the first devices only appeared in 2008, said ABI Research.
Where generally a smartbook may be defined as a device somewhere between a smartphone and a netbook, ABI Research defines it as a low-powered, always-on device with a WiFi or other connection (cellular, broadband) that is a subset of an MID (mobile Internet device) and netbook, and does not use an x86 processor. Apple’s iPad, by that definition, qualifies as a smartbook.
ABI suggests suppliers keep prices on smartbooks down to $200 or less.

Traffic’s Getting Worse (Again)

Here’s a selling point for car electronics and GPS devices: the typical commuter with a 30-minute ride to work spent 22 hours stuck in traffic last year.

But in the most congested segments of the U.S., the average commuter could spend 20 hours a WEEK in traffic.

Traffic congestion is getting worse, after a brief dip due to high unemployment and the resulting fewer drivers commuting to work.

According to INRIX, which provides traffic information for navigation devices, gridlock began declining in April 2009 but is now starting to rise.

INRIX reported that the top 10 most congested cities in 2009 were:

1. Los Angeles, Calif.
2. New York, N.Y.
3. Chicago, Ill.
4. Washington, D.C. (up from 6th in 2008)
5. Dallas, Texas
6. Houston, Texas (down from 4th in 2008)
7. San Francisco, Calif.
8. Boston, Mass.
9. Seattle, Wash.
10. Philadelphia, Pa. (up from 11th in 2008)

The above cities account for half the nation’s traffic congestion.

Although traffic is beginning to increase once again, the economic slowdown caused 2009’s congestion level to drop by a third, compared to peak levels in 2007.

Some other INRIX data tidbits:

Wednesday from 8 to 9 a.m. is the busiest morning peak travel time nationwide and Friday from 5 to 6 p.m. is the busiest evening (and overall) commute hour.

The best day to commute is Monday and the worst day is Thursday.

More than 2500 miles of the nation’s most important roads are congested more than 5 hours each week. Drivers on more than 437 miles of these roads experience more than 20 hours of congestion each week, or 4 hours each work day.

The worst bottlenecks in the country are:
1. New York: The Cross Bronx Expressway/I-95 Southbound at the Bronx River Parkway
2. Chicago: I-90 Westbound at Cermak Rd. (up from 7th in 2008)
3. New York: Cross Bronx Expressway at I-895 (up from 5th in 2008)
4. New York: Cross Bronx Expressway at White Plains Road (up from 5th in 2008)
5. New York: Harlem River Drive Southbound at 3rd Ave. (down from 2nd in 2008)
6. New Haven, CT: I-91 Southbound at Hamilton St. (up from 62nd in 2008)
7. Los Angeles: US-101 North bound at Los Angeles St.(up from 13th in 2008)
8. Chicago: I-90 Westbound at 18th St. (up from 24th in 2008)
9. New York: Cross Bronx Expressway at Westchester Ave. (up from 11th)
10. Chicago: I-90 Westbound at Ruble St.(up from 26th in 2008)

INRIX tracks (via cellphone, GPS, etc.) 1.6 million vehicles traveling the roads daily. These vehicles include taxis, airport shuttles, delivery vans, trucks and consumer vehicles. This is called a “probe” network because all of the vehicles serve as traffic probes, transmitting data on their speed, and location.

For more information about traffic in your city see: http://inrix.com/scorecard/.

Walmart Buys VUDU

In a signal that ordinary TV-watching is now a thing of the past, and Internet-connected TVs will soon be every-day, Walmart said it acquired VUDU.

VUDU connects your TV, Blu-ray player, etc. to new movies and TV shows (without requiring a computer). Companies including LG, Mitsubishi, Samsung, Sharp, Sanyo, Toshiba and Vizio have aligned with VUDU to include its service in their video products. A nice review on VUDU can be seen here.

Walmart’s acquisition of VUDU is expected to close in a few weeks for an undisclosed sum, although The New York Times said the deal was valued at over $100 million and that VUDU raised $60 million in capital prior to the deal.

VUDU has licensing agreements with almost every major movie studio and it offers approximately 16,000 movies. Through a broadband connection, users may rent or buy titles for immediate viewing. VUDU has also partnered with Facebook, Flickr, Twitter, The New York Times and The Associated Press to add their applications to the VUDU service.

VUDU executive VP Edward Lichty said the deal with Walmart will “take our company’s vision to the next level. VUDU’s services and Apps platform will give Walmart a powerful new vehicle to offer customers the content they want in a way that expands the frontier of quality, value and convenience.”

VUDU, based in Santa Clara, Calif., will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Walmart.
Source: Walmart

B&N Ups Nook Supply

Barnes & Noble said sales of its nook eReader have been surprisingly strong, leading the bookseller to ramp up nook production and devote more manpower to selling the product in stores.

B&N outlets will start offering live demos of the $259 nook in the next two or three weeks, said the company during a conference call with analysts Tuesday.

CEO Steve Riggio said of the nook “We’re ramping our investment in the necessary people and technology to establish a strong market position.” More in-store personnel will support the nook and supplies of the eReader are currently healthy, said the company.

Barnes & Noble operates over 700 retail outlets and over 600 college bookstores. In addition to the nook, it also plans to merchandise Plastic Logic’s Que eReader in B&N bookstores and on line.

The 3G wireless nook shipped late in 2009 and then quickly went into backorder over the holidays. Fresh supplies of the nook began shipping earlier this month.

The nook has dual screens including a 6-inch screen for reading and a smaller color touchscreen LCD for navigation. It offers free 3G service for over-the-air book downloads. It also supports WiFi. The device runs on Android and may support additional apps in the future.

The nook permits a “LendMe” feature that lets users “loan” eBooks to friends by emailing them to a friend’s PC, Mac or smartphone. Nook users can also browse through eBooks on their nook via WiFi when visiting a B&N bookstore.

Approximately 3 million eReaders sold in 2009 and sales are expected to double for this year. By the end of 2010 there will be an existing user base of approximately 10 million eReaders said B&N, citing industry forecasts.

Source: Barnes & Noble

New TomTom iPhone Dash Kit

Love your turn-by-turn navi, but hate having your windshield blocked? There’s a new stick-to-the-dash TomTom kit for the iPhone for the European market, but unfortunately there’s no word yet on when it will come to the U.S.
The ProClip joins TomTom’s original iPhone GPS kit, which mounts on the windshield. The ProClip comes in different versions for different vehicles, and it lets users choose a permanent spot on the dash to mount an iPhone. The ProClip has the same features of the original iPhone car kit including built-in GPS receiver, speaker and microphone for turn-by-turn directions and Bluetooth communication. The kit also charges the iPhone battery and comes with an audio connector to the car radio. It is available now for pre-order in Europe at the equivalent of $135.

Source: TomTom

Alpine, Directed Join MESA

MESA, Mobile Electronics Specialists of America, the member-owned car electronics buying & marketing group, announced its key supplier members will include Alpine, and Directed Electronics as well as the previously announced members: Kenwood, JL Audio, Rockford Fosgate, Hertz/Audison, IXOS and Hushmat.

MESA will also add a car video supplier and an iPod integration supplier to be named shortly. No additional full line car stereo vendors are expected to be added to MESA’s roster, said executive director David Schwartz.

MESA is the 20-member car AV buying group that plans to expand to 60-retail members with an eventual buying power of about $0.5 billion, it said.

The group says it differs from the In-Car Experts (ICE) buying group (which Schwartz co-founded prior to his post at MESA) because it is owned by its retailers and governed by a board of retailers, where ICE is a for-profit group, Schwartz said. MESA hopes to model itself after the Home Technology Specialists of America buying group, which is also member-owned.

“When a retailer tries to get into MESA, he goes through an application process and then the seven board members vote on the member. That’s a big difference. At ICE, the executive director decides….so this is a retailer review process,” said Schwartz.

Vendors who are selected as members receive a higher focus and priority by the MESA retail members. Retailers receive discounts on marketing programs and may participate in vendor programs.

The group has two tiers of retail members: associate members with less than $3 million in annual volume (who are not owners in MESA) and higher volume retailers who are owner-members.

Retail members receive discounts on radio and TV ads among other marketing tools. MESA TV ads cost about $750 to produce compared to a $10,000 to $15,000 cost if the retailer bought the ad as a singular company, said Schwartz.

Board members include Mike Cofield, MESA president and president of Austin, Texas-based Custom Sounds, John Coleman, president of Stereo King, Portland, Ore., Rick Snelson, president of Car Fi, Springfield, Miss.; Charlie Weisel, president of The Specialists, Tucson, Ariz.; and Mehdi Narimanian, president of Sound of Tri State, Claymont, Del., J.R. Stocks, general manager of Freeman’s Stereo Video and Kevin Clark, president/CEO of Drive-In Autosound.

Photo Caption: Mike Cofield, MESA president

First 4G WiMax Phone Due By June

Sprint will launch the first 4G WiMax mobile phone during the first half of this year, creating a phone capable of transmitting video ten times faster than a 3G phone, said Forbes.

PC cards and USB modems have been offered for Sprint’s 4G WiMax service, but so far no phones.

Sprint, together with Clearwire offer WiMax in 27 U.S. markets and will soon add Houston with  Boston, New York, San Francisco and Washington expected by the end of the year.

Source: Forbes

TomTom: US PNDs to Fall in 2011

TomTom offered more insight into the challenging portable GPS market Thursday admitting that industry-wide U.S.  sales could start to decline by mid-2011.

While 2010 should see flat global portable navigation device (PND) sales for TomTom, the company noted that industry sales in Europe have started to decline and the U.S. tends to follow the European market by about 18 months.

European PND sales fell 13 percent in the fourth quarter from 4.9 million to 4.3 million units.

On a brighter note, prices will not see the 20 percent slide of 2009 said TomTom CEO Harold Goddijn.  The reason is that more PND consumers are second-time buyers who want more advanced features.  Also, there are fewer competitors.

During a conference call with analysts, Goddijn responded to a question about competition from smartphones stating, “Navigation is happening increasingly across multiple platforms…we think in a strange way they will strengthen each other… PNDs do have a unique position in the space.  We have sold 42 million devices over the past 5 years.  It’s optimized for navigation, fully dependable…not dependent on a network connection and it delivers a trusted dependable user experience. It’s in that context we believe a larger portion of motorists will continue to rely on a product category that has done so spectacularly well in the past.”

However, TomTom itself is broadening into smartphone and automotive GPS which represented 25 percent of revenues for the fourth quarter ended December 31, 2009 compared to about 17 percent earlier. TomTom reported it swung to profitability during the quarter.

TomTom also defended its Tele Atlas maps business outlook, despite the offering of free navigation by Nokia and Google.

In mobile phones, “the map is often seen as the grid to which all the information is referenced.  It’s not just about navigation, but in a way, the map is a mobile browser for many applications.”  Goddijn claims that the “strategic importance of having maps [on phones] has not diminished but has gone up…but the business model is less clear…how are companies going to make money out of the deployment for maps and the licensing of maps.  It’s too early to give hard answers…the industry is trying to figure it out.  But, I do believe for TomTom, there will be great opportunities in licensing and technology deals.  We will learn a lot in 2010 on what we can do with maps in a mobile environment and it will go beyond navigation, obviously.”

Some other notes from the conference call:

Tele Atlas maps are moving from quarterly updates to updates every 48 hours.

TomTom’s success with “LIVE” services such as live searches and advanced traffic  is mixed, it said.  TomTom shipped about 900,000 connected devices in one year and it is serving about 400,000 subscribers, including those on a trial.  “That’s not where we want to be.  We want…it to be a larger proportion of our overall product mix and we’re working hard to make it a reality.”  The good news is that traffic reports are becoming more reliable, he claimed, adding that live traffic “will happen one day.  It will break through into the mainstream.”

TomTom is less certain about its long term future delivering apps to the iPhone.  Although it was happy with the 100,000 iPhone app subscriptions it saw in the fourth quarter,  Goddijn said, “We’re enjoying that, but we’re not building a five year company plan around the app.  It would not be the right thing to do.  It’s a more vulnerable business where you are not completely in control of the product offering and distribution.”  The app will remain an important product for 2010 but “it’s more difficult to predict the possibility for the product over a longer period of time,” said Goddijn.

Tablet Wars Heat Up

With Apple’s iPad starting to rollout next month, more information is leaking on competitive tablets from Hewlett-Packard and Dell.

HP execs will meet in the U.S. and Taiwan  to determine the price of the HP Slate tablet PC, reports the Wall Street Journal.  The computer company plans to launch the Slate below the starting $629 price for the 16GB 3G Apple iPad, the WSJ said.

Dell has also been showing its Mini 5, 5-inch tablet and Microsoft may or may not introduce a  dual-screen Courier tablet, according to media reports.

The Dell Mini 5 looks a bit like an iPod Touch.  It runs on Android using a 1GHz Snapdragon processor and has a 5 megapixel camera, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and 3G mobile says CrunchGear.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer showed off the HP Slate at the Consumer Electronics Show in January.  It runs Windows 7 and can act as an eReader through Amazon’s Kindle software for the PC.

Kindle for BlackBerry

BlackBerry users can now read eBooks from Amazon.com on their smartphone, as the eBookseller launched today its “Kindle for BlackBerry” app.

The Kindle app is now offered across numerous devices including the iPhone, iPod Touch, PCs and Kindle eReaders and it will soon be available for the Apple iPad and Mac, said Amazon.

BlackBerry users can now read eBooks between meetings said Kindle VP Ian Freed (yes, he did actually say that). “Since the launch of our popular Kindle for iPhone app last year, customers have been asking us to bring a similar experience to the BlackBerry,” he said.

The app allows users to download eBooks over-the-air and to read them on the BlackBerry.  Users can search through more than 420,000 titles including 102 of the 112 New York Times best sellers.  Users can also “browse” through books from within the Kindle app.

Apple May Offer $9.99 eBooks Joining Amazon

Apple’s plans to sell eBooks at higher prices than Amazon, in a much welcomed stroke for publishers, may not be as generous as it appeared, reports the New York Times.
Apple apparently left the door open to charge $9.99 on some best selling eBooks—the same ultra low-ball price charged by Amazon.
When Apple first introduced the iPad, it announced eBook prices of $12.99-to-$14.99, but apparently that does not include all titles.

Source: The New York Times

TomTom Ups GPS Share to 30%

TomTom reported it swung back to profitability in the fourth quarter ended December 31, 2009, claiming it saw little impact from smartphone GPS and that it boosted its portable navigation device (PND) share to almost 30 percent in North America.
TomTom CEO Harold Goddijn said of smartphone GPS, “We see limited impact from this on our current revenue streams from PNDs, automotive and fleet management.” Instead he said demand for location-based applications will present new opportunities.
TomTom sold 100,000 downloads of its iPhone app in the fourth quarter. It shipped a record 5.1 million PNDs globally for the fourth quarter up 15 percent from 4.4 million in the quarter in 2008. For the full year, TomTom shipped 11.6 million PNDs globally, down 4 percent from 12.1 million in 2008. Sales for 2010 should be flat at about 11.6 million units, it said.
Total industry PND sales for North America grew 8 percent in the quarter year/year to 8.6 million units, up from 8 million units and TomTom’s market share increased to 29 percent from 20 percent. In Europe, however, PND sales decreased 13 percent from 4.9 million to 4.3 million units for the fourth quarter year/year.
The company claimed there is still room for growth and innovation in traffic delivery and maps. “Traffic information is a key investment area for us,” Goddijn said claiming TomTom will innovate in traffic accuracy, coverage and in predictive traffic in a growing number of countries, (although we don’t know if that includes the U.S.)
In maps, the company which owns map maker Tele Atlas said it will add features such as slope, lane and curve information. (These details are useful to new driver assistance products such as lane departure warning systems and early crash warning systems, which are a growing OEM and aftermarket segment.)
TomTom revenue increased one percent year/year to the equivalent of $725 million. The company earned $99 million compared to a loss of $1.3 billion in the same quarter in 2008 when TomTom took a write down on Tele Atlas, which it acquired in 2008.
TomTom said its average selling price for PNDs was $108 in the fourth quarter compared to $136 for the same period in 2008 or a 21 percent decline. The decrease in ASPs as due to the increased share of PNDs sold in the U.S. versus Europe as discounting is greater in the U.S., said the company.
Gross margin for the quarter was 46 percent—an increase of 1 percentage point compared to the period in 2008 and a decrease of 6 percentage points sequentially. This is explained by heavier discounting typical of the fourth quarter.
For Tele Atlas, revenue was down 8 percent for the quarter to $68 million from $75 million a year ago. Revenue for the year was $252 million down 6 percent from $267 million. Tele Atlas said it signed a deal with Samsung which will use its maps for its GPS-enabled devices.
The company also confirmed that Tele Atlas CEO Bill Henry will step down.
TomTom expects flat revenue and earnings per share in 2010 compared with 2009.
Source: TomTom
Photo: TomTom CEO Harold Goddijn

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