January 23, 2020
Gokul Nair
7 minutes
Gary Burrell and Min Kao founded “ProNav” in 1989. At his job prior, Gary pioneered the integration of communication systems with navigation technology. This was at King Radio, which designed air navigation and radio equipment. He recruited Ming during this period. At the time, GPS technology was very niche, still in its infancy. The U.S. Department Of Defense developed GPS strictly for military use in the 1970s. It was only approved for civilian use a decade later. Over time, ProNav rebranded itself to “Garmin”. Derived from the first halves of the names of its founders Gary and Min. Garmin sold…
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January 16, 2020
Gokul Nair
9 minutes
There’s a small town in the Greater Boston Area that goes by the name of Belmont. Back in 2013, a woman was driving home with her kids, and her GPS told her to turn right- right onto a railway track. Now, most people in this situation would have had an appropriate reaction along the lines of “What the hell?” before driving home, trying to remember if the T&C on their warranty card was past the date of expiry. But this woman was not most people. Because she ended up turning right- right onto the railway track. For those of you…
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October 11, 2019
Gokul Nair
10 minutes
Do I really need GPS? I don’t have amnesia, but my memory isn’t exactly photographic. Which is a problem. You can’t afford to go by your non-photographic memory. Especially when you’re riding at 7 PM in Los Angeles (so help me God) and part of your commute involves the 405. Bad memories man. “Did I miss the right turn? Or turn right at the wrong turn? Do I turn right at this turn?”And if I catch a signboard or a landmark at the last minute, I can’t switch lanes. And the farther away you get from the city, the worse…
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