FEATURE LOCATION BASED SERVICES
significant proportion of the market. “Thus
It is looking increasingly
a low hanging LBS fruit. According to the
far, despite vendors promising initial offer- research, 60 per cent of UK and 70 per cent
ings, we have lacked a concerted industry
as though the role of the
of US users would use such a service, while
push to deliver these solutions to market.
Indeed, it would appear that most of this
operator in LBS will become
only a quarter of consumers in each country
would consider paying.
push has been a matter of legal requirement
rather than customer need. For example, the
marginalised. Advertising, is
The IDC results are backed up by the car-
riers. Hutchison’s Carl Taylor: “Advertising
penetration of GPS-enabled handsets has been
being held up by some as a
revenues will certainly be a component of
particularly marked in the US, where the FCC future revenues, but it is excessive to say
is forcing operators to deploy high-accuracy potential LBS saviour that it will be a ‘saviour’. The ad money will
mobile location technologies under the E911 be split several ways.
mandate,” says McQueen. “LBS adds a very important factor to
The legal necessity for GPS-enabled hand- advertising as it allows local targeting and
sets in markets such as the US will, thanks to Common consensus says anything other brings mobile advertising possibilities to
competitive forces and greater scale, almost than GPS—Cell ID, Enhanced C-ID, Uplink many smaller companies. Operators like
certainly have helped improve affordability. Time Difference of Arrival—is simply too 3 believe in establishing a differentiated
Nigel Wright, vice president of wireless at com- slow and/or too inaccurate for LBS to advertising market where the quality of
munications vendor Spirent: “With GPS receiver succeed. Alistair McRonald, LBS product their inventory (how accurately location
chips now having reached the wholesale price consultant, O2: “In my opinion the lack of can be ascertained, for example) will dictate
of $2 (and still falling), and coming embedded success has been down to expectations of the price that can be set for LBS-enabled
in many high end wireless devices, including accuracy. Users have become very com- advertising. This will set their inventory at
the Blackberry 8300 and the Nokia N95 or fortable with the accuracy of sat nav. LBS a premium above the MVNOs, and certainly
6110 Navigator, could we finally see LBS gain levels do not provide the same high level of well above the off-portal mobile websites,”
a foothold in Europe?” accuracy… All of the mentioned network- says Taylor.
Maybe, but technology is not the only bar- based solutions are still compromises. Only Interestingly, Taylor also suggests access to
rier. There is also the issue of user demand GPS/A-GPS will provide the accuracy that LBS co-ordinates may soon become available
versus cost of service. At present, it would customers expect.” as a paid-for service from several leading
be fair to say that demand for LBS is low. GPS, of course, is free, thanks largely to operators—as a standardised third party
Surveys, almost always commissioned by the US Government. Is it possible that the API. This brings one of the other major bar-
LBS firms, will crop up from time to time carriers will miss out on location? Nokia’s riers firmly into focus, that of privacy. Taylor,
proclaiming that demand is high, of course. Steven Knuff thinks not: “Not so much though, believes consumers are becoming
Consumers, when asked whether they would because unless the user has downloaded much more comfortable sharing personal
like location services, such as navigation, will all of the maps to the device. The device is information.
almost always say “yes”. This type of positive still asking the operator to download new “We observe that the attitude towards
reinforcement disguises the fact that the maps or if you want to do a search around, privacy and location is changing, due to GPS
general level of LBS awareness is low. you can query the server to find out exactly navigation, applications like Yahoo zonetag,
However, the continued success of in-car where Joe’s Pizza is, it’s not going to be which are then shared through Facebook for
GPS systems, offered by vendors such as right there on your map all the time. Obvi- example,” says Taylor, adding: “This trend
TomTom, GPS-Buddy (partner of Garmin) ously, there are ways that these services are is likely to affect search and will allow
and Navman Wireless, may herald a greater going to help the operator as well. It is not for automated locating and consequently
push for GPS in handsets, which could, in that Nokia is out to get the operators, we’re more relevant and targeted search results.
turn, bring about the launch of attractive looking to partner with them to make the Privacy is not a problem when the benefits
location based services. According to Informa experiences better.” to the consumer exceed the potential minor
Telecoms & Media 2007 will be the first year Still, it is looking increasingly as though privacy issues.”
that GPS-enabled handsets will outsell non- the role of the operator in LBS will become LBS is moving on, albeit very slowly.
connected GPS devices. marginalised. Advertising, as is so often the The technical glitches are being overcome,
“As more compelling LBS content becomes case these days with flagging data services, its visability is much improved and car-
available, more and more customers will is being held up by some as a potential LBS riers are starting to launch more creative
increase their usage or start to use location saviour. applications. However, it is still nigh on
based services,” says Helen Brockett, a spokes- New research from IDC, carried out on be- impossible to find accurate user numbers
person for Vodafone. Carl Taylor, Hutchison half of LBS stalwart TruePosition, held some or indeed concrete revenue figures. Over 30
Whampoa Europe’s director of applications & good news for operators, the firm says. Accord- of the world’s leading carriers were sur-
services, concurs: “Are users aware of LBS? Yes, ing to the survey, the majority of consumers veyed for this feature, with the exception
increasingly so, with the consumer familiarity are receptive to advertising sponsored local of DoCoMo, none were willing to supply
kick-started by Google Maps, and the popular search services. user numbers. It pays to keep tabs on the
TomTom service in cars. Bluetooth GPS units IDC said that if service providers can agree subject, but the search for LBS success is
are available in high street shops.” a free ad-based usage model, local search is as elusive as ever. ®
42 Mobile Communications International | First for news, best for business
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