Garmin Quarterly Report Highlights Trends, Smartphone Competition

Conference calls for company quarterly reports are usually dull, but this week, Garmin's call highlighted the state of the GPS market in these turbulent times, and shed some light on the company's approach to the emerging competitive threat from smartphones. Sales in the automotive and aviation segments decreased in the third quarter, but sales of fitness GPS devices, such as the Garmin Forerunner and Edge, increased 11 percent, a real bright spot for the company. Garmin representatives laid out their case for dedicated personal navigation devices over smartphones, and said there is no Garmin standalone smartphone app in the works. Read on for more. Image © Garmin