Question: News: Technology buffs have been quick to predict the death of personal navigation devices--those clunky little boxes in cars that call out driving directions in an austere, yet soothing, tone.

After all, Apple's (nasdaq: AAPL - news - people ) iPhone and Nokia's (nyse: NOK - news - people ) smart phones have pretty good global positioning software. It seems odd, then, to think that drivers would want to spend hard-earned gas money on yet another gadget that can do the same thing.

But spend they do. That's why the major device makers aren't throwing in the towel just yet. Even though the two big boys in the market--Dutch manufacturer TomTom and its U.S. arch-rival Garmin (nasdaq: GRMN - news - people )--have had mixed financial results during the first half of 2008, they know these devices are in demand.

Indeed, the personal navigation device market is expected to swell to about 110 million units worldwide in 2012, from an estimated 60 million units this year, Gartner analyst Thilo Koslowski estimates. Although prices will almost certainly come down, the volume increase is nothing to sneeze at.

"Personal navigation devices are very much the navigation device of choice and will remain so for the next five to ten years," says TomTom Chief Executive Harold Goddijn. "Innovation is growing very quickly, while costs are going down dramatically."

Goddijn played down the threat from the mobile phone industry. Phones, he says, are smaller and less sophisticated than standalone global position system (GPS) devices. In the second quarter, TomTom's device sales grew a whopping 71.8%, to 402 million euros ($639.2 million).

Garmin, however, isn't in the same position as its rival. The company has its finger in many different navigation pies, from avionics to mobile phones. It hopes to release Nuvifone--a device that bundles together phone, browser and GPS system--early next year after sorting out integration problems with network carriers. But even after missing second-quarter earnings estimates and slashing prices on its devices due to the sluggish U.S. economy, Cayman Islands-registered Garmin is still upbeat when it comes to personal navigation devices.

Despite its recent woes, Garmin remains upbeat. "The macroeconomic environment has been weak, but we're seeing growth in light of that," says Chief Financial Officer Kevin Rauckman. He expects unit sales growth to double in the U.S. this year; in Europe, he expects a 50% increase. As for the Nuvifone, Rauckman says it likely will not cannibalize device sales for at least two to three years.

But after that amount of time, both TomTom and Garmin know their devices will no longer be premium money spinners and they are scrambling to find ways of shoehorning their technology into more practical hardware, such as car dashboards.

"Car manufacturers are watching very closely at what's going on," Goddijn says. He wouldn't divulge how TomTom's negotiations with automakers were going, but he is already salivating at the prospect of launching later this year in Russia, which is set to overtake Germany as Europe's biggest car market in 2009 or 2010.

Even Dash Navigation--an upstart Silicon Valley company that has cleverly singled itself out as the only navigation company to offer real-time, online connectivity with its services--wants to beat the big players in the race to win the auto space.

"TomTom and Garmin are fundamentally hardware companies," says Dash President Rob Currie. "The car companies are not looking for a partner with hardware. What they're looking for is a partner with service." His company excels in location-based services, having partnered with Yahoo! (nasdaq: YHOO - news - people ) to offer real-time search capabilities that the major suppliers simply do not offer.

While the short-term road ahead should not be too problematic for device makers, all signs point to a make it or break it moment in a few years' time.

And it might be worth keeping an eye on Finnish handset-maker Nokia, which spent $8.1 billion last year to buy digital map maker Navteq--its biggest acquisition ever. The company seems to have a knack for arriving second on the scene but winning pole position in the long run.

Garmin Lost In Economic Downturn

Title: GPS Device Makers Still Own The Road--For Now


News: IT workers are in high demand. Almost every company relies on them, whether it's a programmer, software developer or the person you call when your computer goes on the fritz.

"We live in a high-tech world," said Katie Bardaro, PayScale's lead economist. "There's been super-high demand for IT workers over the past seven years."

The perennial shortage in IT staffers stems from the demands of the job. It requires a specific set of knowledge and skills, according to Bardaro.

In fact, unemployment among IT workers is among the lowest in the nation. In February, the industry's jobless rate was 5.2%, about 2.5 percentage points below the national average, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

And the pay is high. Median income ranges from about $50,000 to more than $100,000 a year. Pay raises for IT workers outpaced all others over the 12 months ended March 31, reported PayScale.

Title:
Answer: 5 jobs with the biggest pay raises