New Product Update:
Magellan RoadMate GPS for Vehicle Navigation
Soon to be released. We hope to have these in by early November. Actual sale price is not yet known.
Press Release:
IN ANY CAR, AT ANY TIME, TURN IT ON AND GO! NEW MAGELLAN ROADMATE PORTABLE VEHICLE NAVIGATION SYSTEMS PUT DRIVERS IN CONTROL WITH EASE
Contains Proven Technology Used in Hertz NeverLost Systems with Enhanced Interface, Including Voice-Prompted, Turn-by-Turn Directions, Color Touch Screen Display, Extensive U.S. Map Detail
Santa Clara, CA (October 21, 2003) Car-to-car, turn-by-turn and point-to-point. No matter where you are, where you’re headed, or what vehicle you’re driving, the new Magellan® portable GPS vehicle navigation solutions deliver innovative design and unrivaled ease of use. Thales Navigation, a leading global provider of Magellan GPS solutions, today announced two new vehicle navigation solutions in the Magellan RoadMateTM series to be introduced in time for the holiday buying season.
Magellan RoadMate fuses new advanced features with technologies developed by Thales Navigation for the most proven vehicle navigation system in the world, Hertz® NeverLost®, which has safely guided millions of people to their destinations.
Once vehicle navigation was considered an extravagance reserved for luxury car owners, but the portable Magellan RoadMate 500 and 700 are the first products to offer simple, affordable yet fully-featured street navigation so any driver — from the road warrior to the soccer mom to the vacation traveler — can gain time-saving efficiency and peace of mind.
The flagship model, Magellan RoadMate 700 is the only system in its category to provide a complete built-in map of the United States, so drivers can navigate seamlessly anywhere in the country. With an internal hard drive, Magellan RoadMate 700 is pre-loaded with the latest mapping data for the continental United States and Canada. It provides fast, reliable guidance to nearly every address in the country, including two million points of interest such as restaurants, parks, gas stations, banks, schools and police stations. The mid-level Magellan RoadMate 500 uses a compact flash memory card, which can store user-selected areas of the U.S. and Canada mapping data that can then be uploaded from the supplied software.
“The Magellan RoadMate built-in tutorial, and intuitive configuration make the system easy to operate from the start,” said Lonnie Arima, vice president of worldwide consumer sales and marketing for Thales Navigation. “And, since most households have more than one automobile, portability is another key benefit that makes our new Magellan RoadMate systems outstanding, cost-efficient, vehicle navigation solutions. The introduction of these innovative products also proves yet again that Thales Navigation is committed to making products that respond directly to our customers’ needs.”
Compact and lightweight, Magellan RoadMate sets up for use in minutes without professional installation and the added cost and time associated with it. In addition to plug-and-play set up, a large high-resolution color touch screen, high-quality voice guidance prompts, and a wide array of mounting and faceplate options make the Magellan RoadMate series the new standard in portable car navigation.
The Magellan RoadMate 700 and 500 offer complete map coverage using the latest NavTech data for the U.S. and Canada. Both show a clearly visible, full color route, viewable as text directions, as a graphic showing one turn at a time, or displayed on a moving map to show the driver’s progress. Either way, convenient turn-by-turn voice-prompt guidance minimizes the driver’s need to view the display.
To obtain a route, drivers can choose from their personal address book, which stores up to 100 frequent destinations, choose a destination from the points of interest database, or enter a street address using either the touch-screen or keypad. The Magellan RoadMate 700 and 500 offer navigators a choice of several routing methods, including “Shortest Time,” “Shortest Distance,” “Least Use of Freeways” or “Most Use of Freeways.” In addition, the system automatically recalculates a route after a missed turn. For additional information, visit http://www.magellangps.com.
About Thales Navigation
Thales Navigation is one of the world’s leading developers and manufacturers of positioning, navigation and guidance equipment with global operations. Thales Navigation markets its Magellan brand GPS solutions in the consumer electronics, recreation, and automotive markets, and its GPS and GNSS professional products in the survey, GIS/Mapping, and OEM markets. Through its joint venture with Hertz, Thales Navigation has developed the Hertz NeverLost® vehicle navigation system. Thales Navigation’s key innovations include the first U.S. commercial hand-held GPS receiver for positioning and navigation, and the first handheld GPS with industry standard Secure Digital Memory Card capabilities.