My first post of a company that I wanted to fund was any type of company that eased the pain of finding parking in a city like San Francisco. Thank God there are smart people out there! Red Herring has an article called "Parking Pain Relief"outlining a half-dozen startups that are using wireless technology to ease parking pain. This once again illustrates how late I am to the game!
Although the companies all seem to be in their infancy, there are some great concepts out there. One potentially really sweet model is the possibility to detect available spaces via in-car navigation with the ability to reserve the space either on-screen or via cellphone. Thus far parking lots such as BART's in the Bay Area have been the main testing grounds.
All of the startups appear to use sensoring technology on the street. Thus some obvious problems are battery life of the sensors as well as acquisition of the rights to place the sensors on public streets. It also appears that the battle for content will be intense. Information may come via navigation or even XM satellite radio. Thus there will once again be a battle for "eardrums" or "eyeballs".
I love it when a company comes along and tries to make life easier!
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