TomTom CEO shake-up as mapping pioneers depart

The market for automotive navigation technology has evolved rapidly over the past decade, moving from the traditional navigation map for turn-by-turn directions to ADAS maps that feed data into various driver assistance systems and High Definition (HD) maps underpinning autonomous driving. For the early players in this space, it’s been a rollercoaster lesson in adaptability, to various degrees of success.

TomTom was one of the segment’s pioneers, with roots tracing back more than 35 years. Its product line-up has become increasingly sophisticated and diverse, but cracks are showing. The company has reported net losses for the past several years, reaching a nadir of negative €257.6m (US$298m) in 2020. While it has managed to narrow that loss more recently, 2025 still ended €6.40m in the red. In mid-2025, TomTom unveiled a revival plan involving 300 job cuts and a heavy reliance on AI to “realign the organisation with [a] product-led strategy.” Now it’s bringing in new leadership.

Co-founder and Chief Executive Harold Goddijn will step down on 16 April 2026. Goddijn isn’t just any executive—he’s an Automotive Hall of Famer, a visionary who saw the promise of satellite global placement system navigation when the rest of the world was still using a paper road atlas. In 2016 he was knighted by the Dutch Royal Family for his contribution to society. After his departure, Goddijn will retain a nominal voice in the company through a seat on the Supervisory Board.

TomTom is also about to lose the ‘Godfather of mapping’, Chairman Alain De Taeye, another industry legend who led Tele Atlas until it was acquired by TomTom in 2008. For the past few years, he has been serving as a member of the Management Board, tasked with steering the company’s geospatial content strategy and innovations towards an autonomous future.

Another Co-Founder, Corinne Vigreux, is leaving after more than 30 years. During that time, she’s been recognised as one of the world’s top fifty women in tech (Forbes) and as one of the most inspirational women in European tech (Inspiring Fifty). For her contributions to society and the tech sector, she was made Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur in 2013 and Officier in the Royal Order of Orange Nassau in 2016.

No matter how revolutionary and pioneering they may have been, it’s now time to hand over to the next generation. Steering TomTom into an AI-powered future now falls to long-serving Chief Revenue Officer Mike Schoofs, who has said he will focus on scaling the automotive and enterprise businesses.

Challenges and opportunities

Generally speaking, the outlook for automotive location data is hot. It’s the foundation of many new use cases emerging from intelligent and connected cockpits and is at the core of most autonomous driving systems. TomTom’s Automotive backlog currently stands at €2.40bn, and it’s actively positioning AI at the core of its location data strategy. GenAI and agentic AI are expected to reshape the way users interact with navigation-based services dramatically, and TomTom is integrating large language models to realise a more conversational, intuitive and dynamic user experience. But the AI shift won’t necessarily come easily or cheaply.

In its Location Platform Index 2025, Omdia analysts observe: “Embedding GenAI directly into the vehicle software stack introduces additional complexity and dependency on external AI platforms, raising questions around cost control, long-term differentiation, and monetisation.” Pivotally, there’s no guarantee that today’s automakers, some of which are operating on very thin margins, will be willing to pay a premium for conversational navigation. With this in mind, Omdia concludes that TomTom’s GenAI initiatives “currently function more as a defensive relevance strategy—ensuring parity with evolving user expectations—than as a clear near-term revenue driver.”

Then there’s the Overture Maps Foundation. Announced in 2022 as an open-source mapping data collaboration between TomTom, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Meta and Microsoft, the focus was on offering standardised, openly licensed datasets to support the development of new mapping products. But in the short time since its founding, the push for open-source has been replaced by buzz around AI-infused mapping, and there’s now speculation that Overture could be floundering.

At the moment, TomTom is struggling under financial pressures not seen at its closest rivals Here Technologies and Google. The company expects 2026 revenue to fall or at best remain flat, due to negative effects from a shift from old to new contracts. The hope is that this short-term setback will drive growth in the future.

On the plus side, its new Automotive Navigation Application, designed to fast-track development of navigation solutions for software-defined vehicles (SDVs), is playing in a hot spot, offering a quicker route to market and greater development flexibility. TomTom’s solutions for logistics and last-mile delivery have also been pegged by analysts as key growth opportunities.

Moving forward, the company may look to widen its reach with some of the newer electric vehicle (EV) brands, many of which are now eyeing Europe. While it already supplies several Chinese players for export markets, rival Here claims to control about 95% of the location services market for Chinese vehicles exported overseas. This is not only an important revenue source in itself but, more pivotally, gives Here exposure to cutting-edge mobility innovation. “China is where the hyper innovation is happening, and we’re able to be part of that and then bring it to other OEMs in the Western world,” Here Chief Executive Mike Nefkens told Automotive World in January 2025.

While a shakeup in leadership creates market and investment uncertainty, it could be the decisive move that TomTom needs to recreate itself for the AI and SDV age. It’s now over to Schoofs to harness the map-maker’s rich history, extensive partner network and growing asset pool to ensure its future success in the wider realm of location data.