If you’re attending the Consumer Electronic Show (CES) this week and have an Android phone, you’ll be able to use Google Maps to navigate inside the Las Vegas Convention Center. Select resorts and casinos on the Las Vegas strip are also covered, as is McCarran International Airport.
Google has also partnered with some Las Vegas-area Best Buy stores, so it can guide gadget-addled convention-goers straight to the cash register. Today’s update also releases the floor plans of some of the first locations submitted to Google.
The update to Google Maps for Android that launched in November contains indoor maps of participating locations. Google is extending its mobile reach until it can be the end-to-end provider of finding what its users are looking for, period.
There’s a mobile arms race heating up here. Apple’s Siri intelligent search assistant on the iPhone 4S skips Google and goes to Yelp when you search for a local place or business. Apple has also been snapping up 3D mapping technology. Meanwhile, Bing Maps has provided inside mapping since August of last year.
Mobile mapping inside buildings is an important trend, but Google has an advantage of scale. As the map provider for the biggest smartphone platform and the iPhone (for now), the majority of smartphone users are comfortable with Google Maps.
To understand the value of this strategy, look no further than Google’s partnerships with Las Vegas-area Best Buy stores during CES. Google has a piece of every step of the sales process except the cash itself, and it wants in on that, too.
