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Given Nokia’s recent purchase of Navteq and the recent launch of GPS-enabled devices by the company, Nokia obviously has a strong interest in this space… to the tune of $8+ billion! Something that developers should keep in mind is that Nokia is the largest provider of handsets on the planet. With a 39% market share, the company boasts having shipped 900+ million devices. Of theses, some 100 million S60 devices have shipped to date – the company boasts a 52. & % mkt share of converged devices (think all-in-one) with 250 million units expected to ship in 2008. When you think of Nokia you need to consider the mobile developer as the company’s Forum Nokia program currently stands at more than 3.4 million members. This program is essentially a community of mobile innovators and, depending on the level of commitment to program from the developer (i.e. Pro) there are a number of useful resources that can help you get to market, including the Launchpad and other Go-To market programs. There’s also channel evangelism, tools, events and SDKs as well as technical services designed to shorten the time to market for your mobile applications. With the marriage of Nokia and Navteq (still not finalized) these resources will be important asses to the LBS developer in the future.
Some interesting numbers and facts heard at the event:
- 53% consumers want a phone with navigation
- 6 of 9 apps wanted (beyond voice) were location related
- GPS is third most popular search term on handango
- 73% developers see immediate opportunities for commercial applications
- 58% of developers plan to incorporate location information into their applications within 12 months
- Nokia is launching more GPS-enabled devices like the N95, 6110, E90 and more are in the works
- Finally and perhaps most significant, operators are rolling out location enabled services in droves in order to meet consumer demand. These are mainly navigation, friend finder, gaming, and social networking applications.
Quote of the day – The Nokia N95 is the official device of the LBSChallenge
From Nokia, the N95, 6110, E90 all GPS enabled…
Nokia and in particular, the S60 application development environment offers an Open platform and map and navigation framework APIs that include the ability to:
- show location on map
- select locations or objects on maps
- Broad support for JSR 179, on all s60 devices some s40 devices
- S60 Browser – widget runtime and location, std internet technologies – web browser engine available to app developers
- flash lite offers a great UI and location enablers planned – currently supporting flashlite 2.1
- java broad JSR 179 support
- native C++, extensive set of location APIs
- Nokia offers developers the chance to develop in your favorite app dev environment
- S60 location APIs - when you store locations, the landmark data are actually shared amongst all applications.
Nokia LBS technologies
- SUPL, A-GPS
- Java ME JSR-179
- S60 location APIs
- S60 map and navigation framework
- Forum Nokia LBS resources
- Map & navigation framework – coming at s603 FP2:
- map and nav api select a location from map, engaging navigation
- map and nav provider discovery API
- geocoding API
Developers that are creating applications supported by Nokia devices and in particular S60 have a number of ways to get to market in addition to recognition via contest like the LBS Challenge. Perhaps a route to a sales channel like handango, jamba, and handmark. Additionally, “hot” developers may have a chance at getting listed via an On-Device program like the Download NCD – a chance at download via on device portal. Users have quick access to a content download client on the device. Regular updates are added where the consumer has a chance to download and purchase right from the handset.
- currently on 50+ devices, used by 100 million consumers by end of 07 on S60, and S40 devices
- 200k download clients are activated each month
- 2 million consumer users per month
Navteq Maps and data - 100million+ uses a day!
Mobile navigation, local search, real-time traffic… these are just some of the uses of Navteq map data today. So, what are consumers looking for and why is location relevant to their needs? 63% of data users want mobile content - mobile content = location + time + personal interest. Location determines what is relevant and mobile content will become more important than websites in driving customers to businesses. Content owners need to location-enable their content, while expert communities need to view it as a core part of their mission.
Navteq now has a new location content group (LCG) - a new strategic approach to location content creation, management, distribution, and monetization - empowering places and events to tell their story through expert community-based transactions. Navteq data:
Navteq currently supports: static content that resides in the Navteq map and has been verified.
Navteq direct access – allows merchants to upload and manage their POIs in the Navteq POI DB. Self serve tools with advanced content creation and management tools coming in 2008.
The map network – location content for venues, destinations and events.
Map network developed a Superbowl map and sold ad space on the maps.
Navteq discover cities – the Navteq map, 3rd party content (ie. Fodor travel guide), expert community sourced content, multi-modal routing, new geometry-like sidewalks – looking through the lens of the mobile pedestrian… 2.0 coming in December.
Overall, the feeling that came out of the Navteq event was that this is indeed an exciting time for LBS. Don’t bother looking for the killer application, but rather, LBS has now become an expected and required offering by both the device makers and the carriers… 2008 is going to be a big year for LBS, mark my word! All one needs to do is attend a CTIA Wireless-like show or a developer event from a vendor like Nokia and you’ll see that the pieces are all in place:
- We have strong consumer demand
- There’s rapid adoption and revenues generated from the consumer via voice, data, and in particular SMS
- We have more location aware devices coming to market
- The user has been provided with a superior user exp
- go 2 market opportunities are expanding, new business models flourishing, and new solutions emerging.
- and the developer has great opportunities for exposure via highly visible contest like the Navteq LBS Challenge, Handango Champion Awards, Tele Atlas Maps in Apps Contest, and others – location is where it’s at!
During the Connections event, guests were treated to a special lunch hour speaker, Daniel Burrus – a technology visionary. He offered up some advice to developers and entrepreneurs (all are applicable to those chasing the LBS space). Some items to consider that I took away from the session:
- A predictable storm of disruption is coming, make sure you anticipate change, don’t respond to it.
- Hard trends are trends that WILL happen, soft trends MIGHT happen – don’t bet your company on soft trends
- Decomoditize and wrap a service around your offering
- Integrate old and new media
- Standards bring abundance
- Developers should note that people want memories!
- Take note of the 7 pillars or digital marketing: location, content, search, personalization, community, interactivity, presence.
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In preparation for another LBS Challenge, Navteq recently hosted a cozy pre-conference event billed as Navteq Connections. This was a special event designed to inform about the latest in LBS and provide additional information on the status of the LBS ecosystem, availability of developer tools and programs, and the general state of the LBS space. Given Nokia's recent $8 billion splurge for Navteq the LBS acquisition will need to be monetized and will be a focus for application developers in the near future.
