Google Navigation for Android

Yesterday Google annouced its Google Maps Navigation app.



This obviously is the beginning af the end for specialized navigation companies like TomTom and Garmin. With this move they're definitely yesterday's news unless they can come up with some new business model, which I doubt.  Google's announcement follows closely after the announcement that Google doesn't use third party maps (Tele Atlas) for the US anymore because they rather make the maps themselves using all their available  internet data, satellite images and Streetview data.

What's more interesting in my opinion is the new battle this move causes between Android and iPhone - read Google and Apple.

In the recent past the two parties - who were quite close to each other with Eric Schmidt on the Apple Board - have clashed about free Google applications available for iPhone. Apple recently has rejected Google Voice and Google Latitude for their users. Other Google applications like Maps,  News,  Reader (RSS), mobile Blogger, and Calendar are only available for iPhone through internet, thus bypassing downloading and updating through Apple's app store.

Whether Google Nav will be made available for iPhone could be a tough cookie for Apple to chew on for a while. Obviously they won't be making money on the free app unlike for instance the TomTom app that costs $100 and making the free app available will piss off their current navigation partners. On the other hand, denying this free state-of-the-art "killer app" to their customers could deteriorate their customers base and give competitor Android a huge push in the back.