Orbify.eu, a two-year-old Norwegian startup, is developing navigation software that renders 3D maps in a warped, Inception-style perspective, blending a street-level view close to the user with an overhead view further away. Co-founded by former Snøhetta architect Karsten Huitfeldt, the company hopes the design will let drivers and pedestrians understand their surroundings without switching between separate map views, addressing what it sees as stagnation in navigation interface design despite advances elsewhere in automotive tech.

The firm, backed by initial funding from Innovation Norway and Norges forskningsråd, has filed an unpublished EU patent (PCT/EP2026/058725) covering its bending algorithm, shader and camera setup, and last week released a browser-based demo built on the PlayCanvas engine using Gaussian splatting. Huitfeldt says the core technology works and is publicly demonstrable, but no formal study has yet tested whether it actually improves navigation compared with conventional map views, and the company is not claiming superiority ahead of such evidence. Orbify intends to offer the technology as a software/SDK layer compatible with existing 3D mapping and navigation systems rather than building its own mapping platform.