Navigation Start-Up what3words Gets More Money From Mercedes

Mercedes increased its investment and now owns approximately 10 percent of the company.

byDave Bartosiak|
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They say, “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.” Well in the business world, it’s “If you can’t beat ‘em, buy ‘em.” The auto business is becoming increasingly high-tech nowadays, making it tough to stay at the forefront. Rather than building up new technology from scratch automakers are doing the next best thing, investing in start-ups. Looking for a new infotainment system, Daimler has made a large investment in the start-up what3words.

Start-up what3words has divided the world into 57 trillion three-by-three squares. Each one of these squares has been given a unique three-word address, allowing the company to easily map places where street addresses simply don’t exist. An algorithm then applies a list of about 25,000 words per language in a way that you won’t have easily confused name combinations right new to each other.

Mercedes is planning on using an entirely new infotainment system in its new A-Class. They call it the “Mercedes-Benz User Experience.” Set to be in production as early as this spring, navigation destinations can be searched for with the help of the new three-word address. For giggles, you can check out what your address would be at https://map.what3words.com/. I found out that the Daytona International Speedway can be found at weekend.half.waxing. Sounds funny but it does help minimize confusion.

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Speaking on the expanded partnership Sajjad Khan, Vice President of Digital Vehicle & Mobility at Daimler said, "With Mercedes-Benz User Experience, we have moved one big step closer to our goal of making the vehicle into a mobile assistant. Our collaboration with what3words is heading in exactly this direction: Inputting locations in a simple way makes life easier for our customers and ensures a special experience. For this reason, we will further expand out cooperation with what3words in future and develop new fields of application."

Pretty soon we’ll just be yelling three-word phrases at our in-car displays. I supposed that’s better than four-letter words.

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