Amazon is getting more serious about Alexa in the car with Telenav deal

Amazon today announced a significant partnership with Telenav, a connected car and location-based services provider. As part of the collaboration, Amazon’s voice assistant, Alexa, will now be part of Telenav’s in-car navigation systems.

As it stands, Alexa lacks a lot of information that is pertinent to drivers. This collaboration should massively help to change that. The partnership is also designed to enable carmakers to bring Alexa inside more of its vehicles.

“Navigation is among the most popular use cases for in-car technology, and we’re excited to be working with Telenav to make it easier for automakers and suppliers to support voice-first navigation through Alexa,” Amazon Alexa Auto VP Ned Curic said in a statement. “Using the Alexa Auto SDK, Telenav is helping make Alexa a truly integrated part of the in-car navigation system, and providing customers with a more useful, consistent experience at home and on the go.”

Back in September, Amazon announced Echo Auto, an in-car accessory that enables consumers to install Alexa into their cars themselves. Amazon had also previously made Alexa available through certain cars from the BMW Group.

What’s different about this announcement is that Amazon now has the ability to bake in Alexa from the start.

Amazon also today announced a partnership with HERE Technologies to bring a voice-first in-vehicle navigation system into the more than 100 million vehicles today that are equipped with HERE. With this collaboration, announced at CES, people will be able to plan their trips while at home and then, once they get in the car, the navigation system will already know what to do and where to go.

Based on the looks of these two announcements, it’s clear Amazon is ready, more than now than ever before, to be inside your car.