[imok20]

The real key here is Google's efficiency and innovation. They're not simply providing free data for the masses to consume, making nothing off of it and paying to obtain it (as they must, to map the highways and byways of the US).

At it's heart, Google is an advertising company which creates products that use data to place other companies in the eyes of those who use them.

TomTom and Garmin may offer an equivalent (or better) experience for a price, but Google offers an excellent experience for free, the only cost being a little inadvertent exposure to advertisements.

It wouldn't be inconceivable for another company to more efficiently display data and create a better experience for consumers, but profit through advertisements as Google does. Companies do this already. There simply wasn't another model in the mapping industry that could compete. Yet.