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Tag: google-maps

  • What Does Nokia’s Launch of Free Navigation Mean to the Market?

    On 21 January 2010, Nokia announced that it is to make turn-by-turn navigation free with its Ovi Maps offering. The research firm Canalys claims the move is a logical one for Nokia to take, especially in light of the recent launch of Google’s free navigation solution.

    Google’s navigation currently supports only Android devices and is confined to the United States – though Canalys expects both of these limitations to be addressed this year.

    “As Google’s free solution becomes more widely available, it will inevitably have a negative impact on consumers’ willingness to pay for navigation, making it increasingly hard for application providers to charge for their solutions. Yet Nokia’s move should be viewed less as a defensive measure and more as it going on the offensive,” state Canalys.

    “It already has the necessary assets in-house, with its own navigation software, ownership of Navteq, and a huge, growing installed base of GPS-integrated smart phones. In making its own solution free now, it has a head start over Google and any other vendor that follows in every supported market except the US, giving it time to firmly associate itself with the concept of free navigation through promotional activity.”

    Canalys’ end-user research has repeatedly shown that navigation is a feature that consumers want on their mobile phones. Being the first to make global navigation free across so wide a portfolio of devices will give Nokia handsets a true value-add and help it differentiate its products in the increasingly competitive smart phone space, according to the research group.

    Alanysts predict Nokia’s free navigation announcement will not be welcomed though by all its mobile operator partners.

    “While some are happy to endorse or support services that help encourage data consumption, many offer chargeable GPS navigation services themselves, albeit with varying success outside the US, and may well be reluctant to support a move that encourages consumers to expect navigation and other mobile content and services for free, eroding potential revenue streams,” says Canalys.

    According to the analysis, Nokia’s announcement may conceivably push more operators into partnerships with third-party navigation solution providers, where navigation is bundled with the cost of a data plan, providing their own effectively free navigation solutions with an incentive for customers to sign up to data plans, while maintaining customer ownership advantages.

    “Similarly, handset competitors may consider entering into deeper, closer relationships with selected navigation software vendors to offer their own bundled or free solutions. This would minimize Nokia’s ability to use navigation as a differentiator and enable them to also take advantage of the growing consumer appetite for, and expectation of, having free navigation available on smart phones out-of-the-box,” states Canalys.

    That it may prompt operators and some of Nokia’s competitors to pay more attention to their own navigation partner relationships.

    Canalys analysts claim the most significant impact for navigation vendors will likely be the effect that a widespread Nokia advertising campaign will have on consumers and their willingness to pay for navigation.

    "All providers will come under substantial pressure to reduce prices, and few consumers will be happy to pay the kind of prices that vendors such as TomTom or Navigon are currently able to command through application stores,” thay say.

  • iSuppli: Does Google’s PND App Signal the Swan Song of Dedicated Devices?

    For European Portable Navigation Device (PND) manufacturer TomTom and U.S.-based Garmin, Oct. 29, 2009 will indeed be remembered as the day everything changed.

    “Google’s announcement that it plans to launch turn-by-turn navigation on the Android platform would be enough of a headache in itself, but giving it away for free? Sound the alarm!,” says Richard Robinson, iSuppli analyst.

    There has to be some sympathy for PND and navigation device vendors that have spent the last year redefining their businesses in the light of the economic shock that crunched the world economy beginning in the fourth quarter of 2008.

    “But clearly, the announcement from Google is a bit like arriving at work one day to find one of the biggest brands in the world has moved in next door, and is offering a version of your product to consumers—for free,” Robinson says.

    According to him, what is concerning is that TomTom and other EU-based navigation providers are heavily dependant on the success of their hardware and software products, while for Google, this product will represent yet another very small cog in a much more complex machine that is being built to increase the footfall to their paid advertising.

    “Ironically – he continues – the hang over that awaits existing navigation providers is a slice of history repeating itself. Back in 2004, when TomTom released the first PND into the European market, heads were bowed; particularly in the boardrooms of the Japanese electronics manufacturers that dominated the in-dash navigation market.”

    He claims Japanese Tier-1 companies such as Alpine, Panasonic and Pioneer, as well as Harman Becker in Europe, were simply not able to counter the threat from the much cheaper and more flexible portable device sector that was taking hold in Europe. “While the rest of the world looked on, these new kids on the block cleaned up during the next two to three years, with triple-digit growth the norm for all PND suppliers.”

    “So here we are again, but this time the game has changed for good. Clearly, the take-it-or-leave-it nature of free application downloads will do nothing to boost the image of navigation as a smart product. So it’s no surprise that both TomTom and Garmin’s shares have been badly hit since the announcement on October 28th,” Robinson adds.

    iSuppli analyst thinks both companies during 2009 have indeed staged good recoveries in their fortunes—and share prices—but this is move by Google such a disrupter, that it is difficult to see how these device vendors can add real value in the face of the launch of a free app. “No doubt the initial experience will be less rich compared to a dedicated device, but this will change. And it’s not as though Google will be overloaded with complaints about a free app”.

    According to Robinson, the question now is: Will the PND platform become a footnote in history—a one-hit-wonder?

    “Clearly the PND vendors would like us to think there is more in the locker, but it’s difficult to see the next steps for this dedicated device, particularly in the maturing markets of Europe and the United States,” he concludes.

  • Collecting Testimonies of Violence Using Mobile Internet

    Kenya has taken a leading role in Africa by embarking on effective use of Mobile Internet to expose acts of political violence, murder and torture, Ory Okollo the founder of Ushahidi.com told Biz-news.com

    In an interview on the sidelines of Mobile Web Africa conference in Sandton recently, executive director of Kenya’s Ushahidi, Ory Okolloh, said her organization was primarily established to expose crisis situations to empower Africa.

    “In brief, Ushahidi means testimony. The name was derived from Swahili language and Ushahidi was developed to map reports of violence in Kenya after the post election fallout at the beginning of 2008.

    “This is basically about creating technological platform to enable anyone from around the globe to capture reports by mobile phone, web or email. With time, we would want this to work with other online tools,” said Okolloh.

    Ory Okollo

    She said Ushahidi was an open source application which could be downloaded, used or implemented, to bring awareness to regional crisis prevailing on the continent.

    Already some countries such as Uganda, war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Malawi and Zambia are tapping into Ushahidi project to improve and track near real-time stockouts of medical supplies at pharmacies.

    Even renowned international television channel, Al Jazeera, is reportedly using some of the technology from Ushahidi in its work to expose elements of violence from around the globe.

    Ushahidi.com site collects “testimony” on violence as people see it. They can send reports using cell phones and computers to the site.

    The information is logged and registered according to the type of violence (riots, deaths, property loss, rape, looting, etc.) using Google Maps.

    In places and moments when reporting is dangerous and difficult, this kind of program uses information from ordinary citizens to record violence as its happening. Ushahidi was put together by a lawyer/activist, Okollo and a small group of Kenyan, blogger/techies while the post-election violence in Kenya was going on in the early part of 2008.

    It was then used in South Africa to track xenophobic attacks against foreigners, and then in the Democratic Republic of Congo. All these instances can be viewed on the website.

    In addition to offering a method of tracking violence, Ushahidi also serves as a bloggers’ space to talk about new uses of technologies in Africa. Videos produced on the spot that can be uploaded also add to the testimony. It is cutting edge technology married to a citizen empowerment project.

    The collected data is useful for all kinds of people and purposes from NGOs, media, human rights workers, aid organizations to ordinary citizens who want to know what is happening in times of crisis.

  • Google Launches Latitude Friend Finder Service


    Google has launched a new mobile service called Latitude that lets users see the location of friends who opt to share their whereabouts.

    It adds to the existing location-awareness function on Google Maps but is also an iGoogle gadget for a computer.

    The service allows users to see friends’ locations on a map and gives the option to make contact directly via SMS, Google Talk, Gmail, or by updating a status message.

    Google stresses it recognizes the sensitivity of location data, so it’s built privacy controls into the application.

    Users control exactly who gets to see their location, but can also decide the location that they see.

    The service uses cell-phone tower triangulation, GPS or Wi-Fi to find their location.

    As of launch, Latitude is available in 27 countries but Google expects to add to the list shortly.

    It runs on Blackberry, S60 and Windows Mobile, and will be available on Android in the next few days. It is expected to become available for the iPhone, through Google Mobile App, very soon.