During his stay at the Stanford University GPS Lab, NavVis CTO Dr. Georg Schroth comes up with the initial idea to develop a fundamentally new approach to indoor positioning, based on computer vision. This topic later became the basis of his PhD research at the Technical University of Munich (TUM).
As a PhD student at TU Munich's Institute for Media Technology (Prof. Dr.-Ing. Steinbach), Georg begins to make breakthroughs in his research on vision-based indoor positioning. These results lead to the German Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs and Energy awarding funding to the research project. Georg is able to bring Robert Huitl and Sebastian Hilsenbeck on board. With the support of a new team, the research really begins to take off.
NavVis goes from research project to concrete business model after the research team joins forces with McKinsey consultant Felix Reinshagen. is spun off from Technical University of Munich (TUM), an institution that has been pioneering startups for 130 years. NavVis goes on to win several awards and receives broad media coverage. First customer requests are received, followed by the signing of the first contracts.
NavVis wins the VDE Start Up Award for the innovative 3D indoor mapping and vision-based positioning technology. This annual award is organized by the Association for Electrical, Electronic and Information Technologies e.V (VDE) and rewards outstanding technical and scientific achievements in Southern Bavaria.
In November of 2014, NavVis receives venture capital funding from BayBG, MIG Fond and an experienced group of angel investors. This funding helps NavVis to accelerate our growth and further push our technological edge in 3D mapping and indoor navigation. The company also benefits from the deep industry expertise and focus on technology/IP driven business models of the investors, which helps accelerate the business model.
NavVis launches its first hardware product, the M3 Mapping Trolley. This next generation mobile scanning device captures both 360 degree panoramic images, 3D measurements and the sensor data needed for indoor positioning. One of the first customer projects, the digital version of Deutsches Museum Shipping Exhibition, goes online. The European Space Agency and the Bavarian Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy award NavVis with funding for research.
Our flagship software product, the NavVis IndoorViewer, is launched. The IndoorViewer allows users to easily visualize captured building data – displaying high resolution panoramic images and point clouds right in your browser. This enables fully immersive 3D walkthroughs and lets users access building models and maps from any device. The intuitive interface marks a change in how building data is provided to end users.
In December of 2015, NavVis receives a second round of funding, to the tune of €7.5 million. Target Partners and Don Dodge (Developer Evangelist at Google) join as new investors, and MIG Fonds and BayBG increased their previous holdings. This funding allows NavVis to pursue our ambitious growth strategy.
NavVis technology goes international as the first M3 Trolleys are shipped to customers in China, Japan, and the UAE. The growing international user base results increases the uses cases as customers in automotive, retail, engineering start to adopt digital technology for buildings.
In October 2016 we open our first international office in New York City to grow our customer base in North America. The New York office is led by our Head of North America, Evan McPhee. Evan holds a Harvard MBA and has previously worked at Facebook.
The NavVis Campus Maps app is released to showcase our computer vision-based indoor positioning and navigation technology. The app uses our indoor navigation technology and your smartphone camera to determine your location inside a building. This project serves as proof of concept for our software development kit, which lets developers create apps based on NavVis Indoor Navigation technology.
NavVis launches an ecosystem platform for building owners, mapping partners and solution partners to come together and drive the digital indoor revolution. With the NavVis Platform, anyone can build digital indoor solutions based on our technology using the API for the IndoorViewer or SDK for the Navigation App. Learn more at www.navvis.com/ecosystem.
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