Rochester, Minn. — Transplant GPS, an OEM GPS supplier, is launching its first branded retail line of personal navigation devices (PNDs) under the RightWay brand.
Three models, all with text-to-speech pronunciation of street names, will ship by the third quarter and will be sold at several mass merchants, a home-shopping channel and an online retailer, said the company.
Transplant GPS says the three RightWay PNDs are among the few to incorporate a movie viewer combined with an e-book reader, MP3 player and photo viewer. They use SiRF Star III GPS chip sets, Samsung processors and the Windows CE 5.0 operating system. The top-of-the-line model RW430 has a 4.3-inch screen, preloaded maps of the full United States, and provides cues for which lane to enter for the next turn, as well as text to speech. The device also has a built-in two-watt amplifier, 1.7 million points of interest, audio output and a speed-monitoring function.
The RightWay RW355 has the same features, except for a 3.5-inch display, and the leader model RW250 offers a 3.5-inch screen, text-to-speech pronunciation of street names and preloaded maps of the continental United States.
Street prices are $229 and 169 respectively for the RW430 and RW355. Pricing will be announced on the RW250.
Transplant GPS says the new products will be joined by others with advanced features such as Bluetooth, traffic updates and wireless connectivity by the first quarter of 2009.
Transplant has supplied GPS products on an OEM basis since 2000.
