After releasing the most comprehensive Wearable Electronic apparel range for this season, O’Neill Europe, announced the launch of their next High Tech Jacket for the Fall/Winter season 2008/09, the NavJacket – a GPS navigation integrated into a high performance Gore-Tex jacket.
The NavJacket is a collaboration between O’Neill’s Wearable Electronic group and MyGuide – a company delivering GPS navigation solutions.
The NavJacket will help you to navigate through terrain you are not familiar with by entering your desired location and let you guide through the back country.
There are two ways the guidance is done; either via a display (OLED) on the sleeve or via voice guidance via the headphones integrated into the hood of the jackets. Yeah, that’s a lot of technology inside this jacket which will make it the most advanced apparel on the planet.
The O’Neill team didn’t stop here. Your current speed, up-to-date local weather forecasts, and in-depth details about your route, such as distance and time have all been incorporated into the flexible display on the sleeve of the jacket.
Another cool feature planned for the NavJacket is the friend finder function, which will allow you to either track down friends, or choose to follow their path through the slopes.
The NavJacket will be tested the coming winter season on selected areas in the Alps. If you are lucky, you might see someone zipping past you or queuing up on the lift.
I have no doubt that O’Neill is pulling this High Tech Jacket out of their sleeves for the next winter season considering their track record of introducing the most advanced Wearable Electronic apparels for many years now with technologies that seemed ‘impossible’.
