> how much money could be made by licensing that data?
Navteq still do license map data. But it's not as profitable as all that; IIRC they weren't breaking even when Nokia took them over. This seems fairly common in that industry; Ordnance Survey (who aren't fully commercial, but the same concept applies) are heavily supplemented by public money, for example. It's presumably even more expensive to do all the capture for Street View type data.
> Alternatively, how much could be made by creating a map application for the major mobile platforms, and sell it to the consumer direct?
That seems like a pretty good idea to me, although I doubt it's going to dig them out of a €1.5bn hole. Still, Nokia don't have a lot to lose at this point, although I feel like they're still in denial about their recent lack of competitiveness in smartphones.
Sorry, probably not the right metaphor to use really. From the article, it suggested that division of Nokia was losing €1.5bn annually, and I don't think selling map software to mobile phone owners would make that much when there are already plenty of free (beer) alternatives.
Navteq still do license map data. But it's not as profitable as all that; IIRC they weren't breaking even when Nokia took them over. This seems fairly common in that industry; Ordnance Survey (who aren't fully commercial, but the same concept applies) are heavily supplemented by public money, for example. It's presumably even more expensive to do all the capture for Street View type data.
> Alternatively, how much could be made by creating a map application for the major mobile platforms, and sell it to the consumer direct?
That seems like a pretty good idea to me, although I doubt it's going to dig them out of a €1.5bn hole. Still, Nokia don't have a lot to lose at this point, although I feel like they're still in denial about their recent lack of competitiveness in smartphones.