u-blox AG acquired Geotate B.V.

u-bloxAG has acquired Geotate B.V. (a joint venture between Road Group Holding AG and NXP B.V.). Geotate develops GPS geotagging solutions based on software GPS technology and related Web services. The acquisition represents an important strategic step for u-blox, as it allows the company to expand its position in the consumer markets with unique GPS geotagging solutions for digital camera manufacturers and other portable device manufacturers.

Key terms of the transaction include:

• Patented technology and products in the area of software GPS and geotagging GPS
• Total consideration EUR 5.5 million in cash
• of which EUR 2.0 million for a royalty free patent license arrangement with NXP B.V. for selected patents
• and of which EUR 3.5 million for the outstanding shares of Geotate B.V.
• u-blox will integrate the Geotate business into its existing activities to leverage and further strengthen the mutual commercial activities

Through the acquisition, u-blox will gain access to a broad GPS patent portfolio and will be able to expand its GPS offering with GPS geotagging products. These products are based on Geotates software GPS technology Capture and Process, which enables portable devices to automatically add a geotag to a picture in a fraction of a second without compromising the user experience or the devices' power consumption. Geotagging is the process of adding geographical identification metadata to various media such as photographs and video.