Monday, June 11, 2007

Broadcom to Acquire Global Locate for GPS Chips and Software

Monday, June 11, 2007  ,  

Broadcom agreed to acquire Global Locate, a privately-held, developer of global positioning system (GPS) and assisted GPS (A-GPS) semiconductors and software, for $146 million in cash.



Global Locate's chips are used in mobile phones from leading cellular handset makers and incorporated into products from TomTom NV, the largest personal navigation device (PND) vendor in the world. Global Locate was founded in 1999. The company is currently producing its third generation of GPS chips and has developed a worldwide GPS reference network that provides assistance data to its A-GPS-equipped chips via cellular data channels (GPRS or 3G), boosting performance and reducing the time required to determine a location by up to 100 times.



Broadcom said it expects GPS to join Bluetooth and similar wireless technologies as a pervasive feature in next generation mobile devices.

http://www.broadcom.com