China's Baidu backs Finland-based indoor mapping start-up
Chinese internet giant Baidu has agreed to invest $10 million in IndoorAtlas, a VC-backed Finnish software developer that specializes in indoor mapping.
Founded in 2012 by Professor Janne Haverinen and four computer science doctorate students at the University of Oulu, IndoorAtlas has developed a technology that uses magnetometers in smart phones to detect anomalies in the Earth's geomagnetic field. This enables it to pinpoint an exact location inside a building with an accuracy of 2 meters.
The technology performs a similar function in navigation indoors to that of the global positioning system (GPS) outdoors, although it does not rely on satellite signals.
IndoorAtlas received $4.5 million in funding earlier this year from Mobility Ventures and Koppicatch, a Finnish seed-stage investor. It will use new capital from Baidu to ramp up R&D, engineering and business development in the US, Asia and Europe. IndoorAtlas will also sign an exclusive agreement for the Chinese market with Baidu, enabling the search provider to strengthen its indoor mapping service.
Haverinen said the partnership with Baidu is attractive because it offers immediate access to over 1.34 billion potential subscribers.
"IndoorAtlas's accuracy and scalability is second to none and clearly complements Baidu's existing mobile Location Based Services (LBS) and maps offering," said Liu Jun, vice president and head of the company's LBS business unit, in a statement. "IndoorAtlas's intellectual property portfolio and global geographical coverage will be instrumental in helping us at Baidu build out our LBS platform for local merchants in China and abroad."
Mapping is one of several areas of competition for China's leading internet companies - Baidu, Alibaba Group, Tencent Holdings and Sina - as they look to diversify their businesses and achieve long-term sustainable growth. Last year Alibaba completed the full acquisition of digital mapping and navigation firm AutoNavi Holdings.
Leading global technology companies are now moving from outdoor to indoor mapping, with magnetic positioning emerging as "the GPS of indoors," said Greg Sterling, senior analyst at Opus Research.
More on Venture
Latest News
Asian GPs slow implementation of ESG policies - survey
Asia-based private equity firms are assigning more dedicated resources to environment, social, and governance (ESG) programmes, but policy changes have slowed in the past 12 months, in part due to concerns raised internally and by LPs, according to a...
Singapore fintech start-up LXA gets $10m seed round
New Enterprise Associates (NEA) has led a USD 10m seed round for Singapore’s LXA, a financial technology start-up launched by a former Asia senior executive at The Blackstone Group.
India's InCred announces $60m round, claims unicorn status
Indian non-bank lender InCred Financial Services said it has received INR 5bn (USD 60m) at a valuation of at least USD 1bn from unnamed investors including “a global private equity fund.”
Insight leads $50m round for Australia's Roller
Insight Partners has led a USD 50m round for Australia’s Roller, a venue management software provider specializing in family fun parks.