LBS

Facebook moving towards Nokia’s HERE for mobile

Social media giant Facebook is showing a strong interest in Nokia’s HERE mapping suite for its mobile offerings. TechCrunch first flagged the move up, which was subsequently confirmed by both companies.

Nokia loses Here head

Nokia, or what’s left of it, looks to have suffered another blow as the head of its location based services division, Here, quits to focus on his own projects. Nokia’s Here unit was born out of the company’s $8.1bn acquisition of Navteq and was retained as a key pillar of Nokia following the purchase of its handset division by Microsoft last year.

Google to generate ad sales using Maps app

In a bid to boost revenues from its mobile services, web giant Google has introduced targeted ads into its Maps app for Android and iOS devices. The move could put a dent in mobile operators’ plans to create new revenue streams using location based services.

Customer data creating revenue opportunities in unlikely places

Customer data collected by operators presents an intriguing opportunity and some are finding unusual partners to team up with. France’s SFR is one such operator and Mathieu Gras, head of location based services (LBS), explained that the firm has found itself contributing its data to help increase blood donations among its customer base, build Paris’ public transport infrastructure and even fight crime.

eBay picks up mobile ad outfit Where

Online auction house eBay has agreed to acquire m-commerce and mobile advertising firm Where for an undisclosed sum. Based in Boston, US, Where runs a location-based mobile ad network, which should give eBay greater presence on a local level.

Location is where it’s at

In the third instalment from the serialisation of his book Being Mobile on Telecoms.com, Ofcom’s William Webb looks at the potential for the evolution of location services, and what needs to be done to make it happen.

Turkcell merges LBS offering with Windows Live

Turkish operator Turkcell has become the first operator in the world to integrate its own location-based mobile application to Windows Live Messenger. The application is “Gezenzi”, a location-based Web 2.0 micro-blogging platform.
Gezenzi is a permission-based service enabling members to use a Gezenzi map to exchange information about places.

Skobbler unveils offline iPhone map for Europe

Disruptive mapping firm Skobbler has announced the launch of ForeverMap Europe, an offline map based on OpenStreetMap data. Designed for use with the iPhone, iPad and iPod, ForeverMap is available as a premium download from the UK App Store. Full comprehensive map data of Europe is downloaded onto the mobile device, which can then be instantly accessed without an internet connection.

Motorola snaps up location services firm

US vendor Motorola on Thursday announced that it has acquired a privately held developer of location based software (LBS) known as Aloqa, which has offices in Germany and California.

Apple buys mobile search firm

Apple added another string to its bow this week with the acquisition of a mobile search service which pitches itself as a “virtual digital assistant”.

Vodafone navigation unit at dead end

Just over a year ago, monster carrier Vodafone showed just how serious it was about the navigation space, by spending €26m on the purchase of Swedish navigation and location-based services firm Wayfinder.

Apple thwarts location-based advertising

Apple will prevent third party developers from using its iPhone platform to enable location based advertising, in a move which is perhaps designed to protect its own future plans in the mobile ad space.

Estonian operator trials SIM-embedded GPS tech

Estonian operator EMT said Wednesday that it has completed field trials of A-GPS technology embedded into the SIM card, allowing location based services (LBS) to be deployed to legacy handsets.

Nokia makes navigation free for the masses

Finnish handset vendor Nokia revealed what it’s been up to with location and mapping firm Navteq which it bought in 2008 for $8.1bn. The monster handset vendor is shaking up the mobile space by making mapping and turn by turn navigation available for free to a potential 83 million users.

O2 and Telmap join forces in navigation deal

UK carrier O2 announced on Monday that it has struck a deal with mobile navigation specialist Telmap which will see that firm’s personal navigation and mapping service deployed on the majority of GPS-enabled handsets sold by the operator.

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