Car consortium buys Nokia's HERE mapping business for US $3.01 billion

A consortium made up of Audi, BMW and Daimler has agreed to purchase Nokia's mapping business for an approximate US $3.07 billion. This puts to rest a long standing bid to sell the business which Nokia has developed since it acquired NAVTEQ in 2007.

HERE Maps is ideal for motoring applications and it looks like while the big 3 carmakers have made the investment, the consortium of carmakers that can make use of the technology can only grow. Part of Here Maps' strength lies in consolidating real-time traffic information from vehicles. Uber was reportedly in talks with Nokia for the mapping business and had allegedly offered up to US $3 billion on the table.

Nokia’s CEO Rajeev Suri said that the sale was the best possible option for shareholders, customers and employees of HERE.

”Going forward we can focus on our planned combination with Alcatel-Lucent,” he said, referring to Nokia’s acquisition of its French competitor rival earlier this year.

Nokia, which sold its phone business to Microsoft just last year, has divested the last of its consumer-facing enterprises and can now embark in creating next generation cellular and smartphone infrastructure networks. The company has restructured to take on this long term goal and has even acquired rival Alcatel-Lucent.

The sale will leave Nokia with two operating divisions – its wireless network services arm Nokia Networks, and Nokia Technologies, its technological development and licencing division.