Car sat-nav sales double

Europe awash with satellite navigation car kits

Sales of GPS satellite navigation kits for cars are booming in Europe. Shipments in the second quarter of 2006 were double those of the same period in 2005, according to figures from research firm Canalys.

Almost two-and-a-half million GPS navigation aids shipped in the quarter, Canalys said. It counted both dedicated devices and PDAs that have built-in GPS receivers and can provide turn-by-turn navigation instructions.

Dedicated devices accounted for the vast majority of kits sold, with vendors TomTom and Garmin taking 30 and 17 percent of sales. Handhelds accounted for only 10 percent of the market, down from nearly half in 2005. Canalys pointed to a lack of models with integrated GPS as one reason for this decline.