HERE Puts Eggs In AWS Basket To Expand Connected Car Services

Maps and location services provider HERE technologies has named Amazon Web Services (AWS) as its preferred cloud infrastructure provider.

HERE has been a customer of AWS for several years but is now expanding its affiliation with the platform to grow its business. HERE was Nokia’s mapping service before it was purchased by a consortium from the German automotive industry in 2015.

AWS will be the underlying infrastructure for HERE’s developing connected car services, which collect and use real-time sensor data from vehicles to provide information on traffic conditions, potential hazards and on-street parking.

These services collect data from brands such as Audi, BMW and Mercedes-Benz, with the aim of reducing traffic congestion and making driving a safer experience.

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Built on the HERE Open Location Platform, the company is also developing location services for a range of other industries, including the broader transportation and logistics sectors, infrastructure, manufacturing, retail, and advertising.

“We started using AWS’s storage and compute services for our production workloads several years ago and quickly came to rely on the unmatched security, reliability, performance, breadth, and scalability that AWS provides to us and to our own end customers,” said Angel L. Mendez, Chief Operating Officer at HERE.

“As we continue to expand the reach of our Open Location Platform and enable global access to the world’s leading mapping and location services for consumers and businesses, building on the leading cloud provider with the broadest and deepest capabilities is key to our development and global expansion.”

Mike Clayville, Vice President of worldwide commercial sales at AWS added the company is “excited to work closely with HERE as they launch their first commercial services powered by the Open Location Platform on AWS later this year, and bring incredible innovation to the world of connected cars and the broader Internet of Things.”

AWS is continuing to grow at a rapid rate, recently announcing its planned expansion into Sweden and moving into call centres with a cloud-based service called Amazon Connect.

However, it is facing stiff competition from Microsoft Azure, which has closed the gap over the last few months to become the dominant IaaS provider in Europe.

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