New this year is NAVTEQ Discover Cities. NAVTEQ Discover Cities combines NAVTEQ's mapping data with travel guide information provided by Fodor's. According to NAVTEQ, the Discover Cities product will be made available to developers and OEMs, and will extend the power of the NAVTEQ map by delivering detailed information about cities, tourist attractions, mass transit systems, and other data relevant to urban pedestrians in popular tourist cities. Discover Cities features:

• Over 200,000 POIs (Points of Interest)
• Detailed views of urban geography
• Mass transit system information
• Neighborhood boundaries
• Pedestrian pathways

Additionally, Fodor's travel guide data will provide context with reviews and recommendations on:

• Sights and attractions
• Nightlife and the arts
• Shopping
• Restaurants
• Hotels

So basically, NAVTEQ has teamed up with Fodor's to enhance the mapping data you already get with the NAVTEQ mapping and POI set by providing Fodor's reviews of restaurants, POI phone numbers and hours of operation, relevant mass transit lines and stops, and pedestrian guidance. The data is specifically designed for those visiting large cities, and works much the same way a tourist guide would -- displaying neighborhood boundaries, reviewed and rated restaurants, public transportation, walkways, hotels, shopping, nightlife and more. For an additional fee, NAVTEQ Discover Cities can also provide data on WiFi hot spots, and POI images. No word on specific pricing, but it should make its way into a device near you soon.

NAVTEQ also announced various enhancements to their NAVTEQ Traffic service. NAVTEQ boasts that they have a uniquely comprehensive process of collecting, integrating, testing and distributing traffic information while linked to NAVTEQ's map. By combining multiple sources of historic and real time traffic data, NAVTEQ Traffic is able to offer:

• Traffic flow data from probe sources - Flow information generated from proves placed on vehicles, typically delivery trucks or business service vehicles that report their location via a GPS device. Traffic flow data from probe sources will be an increasingly useful component on an overall traffic solution.
• Traffic for HD Radio - Traffic data delivered over HD Radio systems which combine greater bandwidth for richer content with the reliability of digital transmission.

NAVTEQ also announced the availability of their NAVTEQ Traffic Patterns Database. Traffic Patterns is a database of typical traffic speeds on over 170,000 miles of primary and secondary roads across major U.S. cities, including interconnecting highways. Application developers, fleet operators, automotive OEMs, and device manufacturers may now use this information to further enhance the quality of navigation routing. For example, if you know over the past several years that a particular segment of road is typically slow between 9 and 10 am, you can begin to predict what might happen tomorrow, even if you don't have real-time traffic data available for that road. By knowing the historical pattern, the GPS can suggest alternate driving routes much more confidently. Traffic Patterns delivers attainable speeds for primary and secondary roads in major cities across the US.

NAVTEQ also announced the availability of their Brand Icons. Brand Icons displays recognizable brand logos on the map instead of the generic POI icons. For example, instead a fork & knife logo indicating a restaurant, you would see the McDonalds "Golden Arches" on the map, or the Starbucks logo -- you get the idea. Tele Atlas also announced their own Brand Icon program at CES.

NAVTEQ also took the opportunity to brag about their impressive list of customers, which includes the likes of Alpine, Delphi, Garmin, Information, Lowrance, Magellan, Pioneer, Samsung, Sony, Uniden, and ViaMichelin -- not to mention every major online mapping service (Google, Yahoo, MSN, mapquest, etc.), and almost every in-vehicle navigation system.