gps units for cars

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May 10th, 2008 admin Leave a comment Go to comments

What country was the first to have GPS units in cars?

This came up with a coworker as we were looking for GPS maps in other countries.

Which auto manufacturer / country was the first to put GPS units in cars? Japan? US? Germany? Anyone know? Obviously we’re talking as standard equipment options, not just customized James Bond type alterations.

First used in military vehicles but as far as OEM install GPS units, I would guess Japan would be the first since in NA, Zexel was the first to put the PathMaster in the Avis rental car and Rockwell later took over the deal and Magellan purchased the driver information system from RockWell aka Rocekwell PathMaster later on to be Magellan PathMaster. They were first sold in NA in the Olds 88 and Olds 98 as a factory dealer add on in 1996.
I know Blaupunkt and Alpine also have some first generation back in mid 90′s.
But I am pretty sure the first country that offered an OEM GPS solution was Japan because of how small the regions was and they were into high tech gadget.
Right now they have very neat features that is not currently available in North America like finding POI’s inside a high rise building.