BMW and Mini get Glympse in-car location sharing

BMW has announced a new partnership with Glympse, the mobile GPS specialist which shares your location in real-time with friends and colleagues, to put the service inside BMW Apps ready and MINI Connected vehicles.

With Glympse integration, drivers in compatible cars can quickly broadcast their location to friends through Facebook and Twitter, along with their email and calendar contacts. The service is designed to make it easier to let someone know how far you are away, when you’re expected to arrive and whether you’re stuck in traffic – anyone receiving a Glympse update can view the sender’s location on a real-time map through a web browser, with no need to have the dedicated mobile app installed on their smartphone or tablet.

“With this partnership, we are excited to expand our roster of apps within the BMW Group Application Integration Program. Our drivers will be able to share where they are on the road safely, simply and with a touch of a button,” Phil Johnston, Product Manager for the BMW Group Apps Platform, said of the deal. “Working with the team at Glympse has been a great experience and we look forward to launching the integration together.”

Owners of BMW Apps-ready cars just have to connect their smartphone to the car’s dashboard system to start using Glympse. Bryan Trussel, CEO and co-founder of Glympse, said he was “thrilled to be able to offer BMW and MINI drivers the ability to update friends and family with their whereabouts right from their car. With this integration, we’ve been able to make sharing your location from your car as easy as changing the radio station.”

Glympse is available on iPhone, Android and Windows Phone smartphones, as well as older BlackBerry devices. You can find download links for your own device at glympse.com