DEI Joins With Ford To Offer

By Amy Gilroy -- TWICE, 1/9/2002

Las Vegas - Wingcast, a joint telematics venture between Ford and Qualcomm, will be entering the car audio aftermarket with vehicle locator products late this year through an exclusive partnership with Directed Electronics (DEI).

DEI will offer a vehicle-tracking product using the Wingcast all-digital CDMA-based service. It will allow users to track their vehicles over the Internet and contains remote-start capability and Geo-Fencing, which automatically notifies subscribers by phone, email or pager if their vehicles travel beyond a certain geographical parameter set by users.

DEI is expected to offer the product through its network of 6,000 aftermarket outlets, which include Best Buy and Circuit City, Wingcast said. The duration of Wingcast's exclusive agreement with DEI was not stated.

Wingcast, a telematics company similar to GM's OnStar, was launched in October 2000 and will begin offering an OEM telematics system to Ford and Nissan later this year.