GPS World

Author: Janice Partyka

  • Location Technology, All in the Cars

    Microsoft says this is its last year at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). Fine. Move over because the car manufacturers are using the show to unveil stunning location and mobile offerings. It has only been a few years since automakers started coming to CES to pitch new in-vehicle mobile platforms. This year automakers have been knocking themselves out to bring smartphones, location and cloud content into the vehicle to enhance the driving experience. The CES invasion by the vehicle OEMs started in 2007 when Ford introduced Sync at CES. Kia followed in 2010 with UVO powered by Microsoft. 2012 brings a multitude of OEM mobile announcements, including one from first-time CES participant Mercedes-Benz.

    Cars are getting smarter. Kia unveiled the next-generation UVO 2, which adds a crash notification assist feature that automatically dials 911 on a connected phone when an airbag deploys. It adds a number of location-based services that are controlled via a smartphone app that includes noting a car’s parked location on a map, transferring destinations from Google maps to the navigation system, and monitoring vehicle location and speed.

    And the list goes on. Mercedes Benz made its initial appearance at CES to show off an app that allows drivers to plug iPhones into vehicles to enable the phone’s entertainment and navigation to appear on the in-dash display. Chevrolet introduced a new head unit that will use a smartphone’s apps, such as Pandora, to access cloud-based content and navigation. Ford added Roximity to provide contextual real-time discounts linked to the vehicle’s location and user’s preferences. TCS has its foot in this market, too. It will be supplying hybrid navigation solutions for the QNX in-vehicle car platforms.

    images
    Mercedes-Benz takes center stage at CES 2012.

    After-market activity. You can tweet about your accident, make it a status update, or do both. TomTom has integrated Facebook and Twitter with its navigation app for iPhones and iPads. Information from Facebook events, places and friends will feed to create navigation routes. Destinations and arrival times can then be shared on these networks.

    Heavy-weight skinny nav. Garmin has introduced the nüvi 3500 series, its new flagship personal navigation device, an ultra-thin GPS device with a five-inch screen. Capabilities include digital HD traffic and a smartphone link that can add live services, such as traffic information, traffic camera images, weather and fuel prices.

    Good luck, Verizon. At a time when straight-up navigation is becoming a utility, Verizon is rolling out a new bundled application app package. It includes their navigation app, as well as NFL Mobile, ringback tones and Verizon Video for $12.99. I don’t know much about the NFL Mobile app, but it better be good. Given the poor marks received by Verizon Video and low interest in ringback tones, the package isn’t looking too appealing when navigation is often a freebie.

    Need maps. TomTom will be providing Samsung with map and location content to power the Wave3 smartphone. TomTom will provide map coverage for more than 200 countries, POIs, traffic, 3D maps and landmarks and “safety-related speed cameras.” Safety-related speed cameras?

    Enterprise routing trends. Enterprises using vehicle routing software for fleets of service and truck vehicles are increasing their buying of on-board computers, as well as smartphones for driver interfaces. These products are used for improved efficiencies in planning routes, and often feed analytics into a complex logistics system. Customers who used to be satisfied with just obtaining GPS positions of their fleets are now pushing for more telematics and a connected vehicle.

    Lower prices and more pressure on productivity have pushed demand for on-board computers that can deliver data about the vehicle’s actual route, and sometimes connects to the engine to provide detail on how the vehicle was driven. Other fleets, particularly service fleets, are tending toward integrating routing apps with smartphones. The phones are cheaper than onboard computers, don’t need to integrated, and still can provide turn-by-turn directions to that day’s route. The trend is toward the Android operating system.

  • Freemium Model for in-Vehicle LBS

    Cloud-based infotainment, more tightly integrated apps, and more personalized offerings will change the in-vehicle mobile experience. Interfaces will morph towards combinations of heads-up displays and voice. These were some of the conclusions from my December 1 webinar “Car as a Mobile LBS Device,” with panelists from Ford, OnStar, Pioneer and TomTom.  How in-vehicle apps will be monetized is an open question. When polled, almost half of the webinar audience believed a “freemium” model will prevail. Freemium models work by offering a product or service free of charge while charging a premium for advanced features.

    Close to a third of the webinar participants believed that LBS apps will come as “standard equipment” on new vehicles. Many see mobile advertising as adding a significant revenue stream if the advertising is truly contextual and continues to serve up offerings that are useful to a consumer. Obtaining contextual marketing data about consumers must be done with prudence, but more about that later. The carriers and service providers such as Facebook and Google stand to make the most money from in-vehicle apps.

    Carrier Low IQ. Mobile contextual advertising needs consumer behavior data to work. The behavior data are highly sought because of their value to advertisers. If you haven’t been paying attention, Carrier IQ allegedly has been illegally and secretly recording individual cell-phone user behavior, including location data, across more than 140 million handsets. Carrier IQ maintains that its services count and measure operational information and do not record keystrokes or provide tracking tools.

    Who raised their hands? AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile admitted to using Carrier IQ. Apple said it stopped using Carrier IQ in the latest version of its operating system, iOS 5. Across the board, the companies insist that they only used information to track operational and network performance issues. Security researcher Trevor Eckhart has released a report detailing how Carrier IQ’s software could be used by carriers and device makers to track user activity, actual keystrokes and location data. Now comes renewed scrutiny of the industry by Congress, federal agencies and consumers.

    Checked-out? Facebook consumed Gowalla in an acquisition of the location-enabled mobile social network. Gowalla’s users check in at specific places to share their location with friends. Unable to compete with Foursquare, the Gowalla service will be shuttered by Facebook; however, employees will be kept on, presumably to work on the new Facebook Timeline chronological interface. JWire, a media company, reported results of a survey that sheds light on the category. Consumers are split on their feelings towards location-enabled mobile social networks. A little over a third of respondents indicated positive feelings toward it. Just as many had a poor opinion of it, with the rest ambivalent. Males are more likely to use the service and the most popular check-in categories are restaurants, hotels, bars and health clubs.

    Let There Be Light? Resolution of the LightSquared GPS interference issue eludes. The LTE provider has moved quickly to make added concessions following new reports of GPS interference based on LightSquared’s already previously revised deployment plans. LightSquared’s newest concessions include limiting or delaying transmission power increase. This comes on the heels of reports from a key government committee that LightSquared’s network affects a “majority” of general-purpose GPS receivers and technology used to land planes, but doesn’t appear to have a significant impact on cell phones. “LightSquared signals caused harmful interference to the majority of other tested general-purpose GPS receivers,” said Anthony Russo, director of the National Coordination Office for Space-Based Positioning, Navigation and Timing (PNT) in a statement last week. The federal advisory committee examined tests of LightSquared’s revised deployment plan, which moved transmissions into airwaves located farther away from GPS bands. LightSquared had asserted this would solve the majority of issues with GPS interference, but that isn’t supported by early tests. The final analysis of the tests by the PNT committee is still underway.

  • Indoor Location Apps Lead to Compelling User Experience

    Indoor location technology is evolving; indoor mapping is coming along and apps that seamlessly work in and out of doors will make a compelling experience more compelling. Bringing mobile location to indoors will stimulate our industry. The killer app? Apps that can self learn to be personalized to a user’s life, lived in and out of doors (check traffic before I leave my desk). Hop on board.

    Indoor Mapping. The indoor market is getting more interesting as Google’s Street View Mapping edges indoors. In a new pilot project, Google is providing glimpses through the front doors of retail businesses. Restaurants, hotels, stores, and other venues will show a 360-degree inside perspective. The imagery will appear on Google’s Places pages, all using the same Street View technology that enables its other map images. The company’s plans are to eventually allow users to virtually enter indoor spaces from street maps. It is a way for businesses to entice new customers. Companies in the pilot volunteer for inclusion. The project links nicely to indoor mapping plans under way.

    Finding Location Indoors. Cambridge Silicon Radio (CSR) introduced a new mobile phone processor to improve the accuracy of indoor navigation. It is a “self learning” indoor location platform that fuses real-time Wi-Fi, satellite positioning data, MEMS sensors, and crowd-sourced location data. The company claims it can achieve continuous and rapid indoor position fixes. The system’s distinction, says CSR’s Dave Huntingford, is it doesn’t require manual surveys to build and maintain its Wi-Fi and cellular location data base. The CSR system debuts next year.

    Leading Vehicle Integration. “The automakers that can provide the most elegant integration of vehicle and mobile apps will lead the next revolution of providing social media and other capabilities in cars,” states a report from market analysts IHS iSuppli. Integration is critical as automotive infotainment will derive functionality from smart mobile devices like smartphones and tablets. Globally, Toyota and Ford lead in successful integration of car infotainment systems with mobile devices, IHS iSuppli reports. A study of production-ready applications showed that the Toyota Entune and Ford Sync AppLink apps had the highest performance on at least four criteria, including content variety, level of integration, daily relevance, and implementation.

    Being Watched? The well-publicized case in front of the Supreme Court may define the power of police forces to put location devices on vehicles for surveillance. The court’s decision may extend beyond vehicles into the far more prevalent police practice of tracking cell phones. According to the Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles police tracked 295 phones, up 35 percent from the previous year. The paper reports that a magistrate in Texas who approves cell-tracking requests has used public records to estimate that U.S. federal courts issue 20,000 to 30,000 cell-phone tracking orders annually. In 2010, in comparison, state, local and federal courts approved a little over 3,000 wiretaps.

    Location Data too Accurate? Precise location info spawns lawsuit. Customers concerned about HTC’s location tracking practices have hit the company with a lawsuit. HTC is charged with using the AccuWeather app to track customer’s precise locations and providing it to advertisers who use it for location targeted ads. It boils down to location precision. The suit claims that HTC collects “unnecessarily precise” location data. Weather is a regional phenomenon based on coarse location and can be easily determined by cell towers, and not the GPS data HTC obtains. The AccuWeather app is integrated into some HTC phones and cannot be uninstalled, according to the suit. HTC can be added to the honor roll of company blunders that fuel concerns about the misuse of location data.

    New Innovators. Localmind was one of the winners at recent competitions for young location-oriented companies. This real-time, location-based clever Q&A platform leverages social check-in services. Users can ask questions of others. For instance, someone might query about waits at a restaurant, liveliness at a bar, or the state of the Wi-Fi at a coffee shop. Another winner, Tagwhat, offers a multimedia location guide that reveals videos, photos, narratives, and audio about the world around people wherever they go, based on the users’ pre-selected, customized interests such as food, music, movies, heritage, and sports. Containment in a personalized bubble may or may not be a good thing. A third winner, Right Back on Track (RBT), enables schools to reduce truancy and drop outs. The system lets schools and families know the whereabouts of truant students to enable interventions to attract the students back in school.

  • More than Navigation: Who Cares Where Starbucks Is?

    The location industry is evolving. In the near future we won’t be discussing navigation and mapping as a way of finding the nearest Starbucks. Contextual location driven advertising will start delivering solid revenues, as soon as the market becomes better organized. The value of location information will be magnified as it shifts to the cloud. Vehicle manufacturers will be creating their own rich contextual location information. Near field communication, NFC, with its seat between consumers and cash registers, will provide some of the most valuable location data. These are points all made at last week’s LocNav conference by The Where Business.

    Tipping Point. Half of Americans are not using smartphones. Location becomes more interesting when everyone has a smartphone and it reaches a tipping point. Social proximity and location has big benefits. “When everyone has a smartphone, you can connect via wireless mesh,” says Michael Metcalf of Yahoo. “If I’m in a line at JFK for a cab, I can let others know my destination and I can reduce the line and wait by half.” Geo-fencing has been stymied by the battery drain caused by frequent GPS pinging. Wireless mesh technology solves this issue. Another winner in location is near field communications, which works in short range proximity to enable purchases and other activities via smartphones. It creates a valuable database that includes precise location tracking data.

    Power to the Automotive OEMs. Unlike the rest of the industry, automotive OEMS won’t need to rely on location integrators or cellular providers to provide them with a driver’s location. With integrated GPS and communications, they are well equipped to understand the context of where drivers are located, what they may be doing, and where they may go next. “In the past, the automotive industry didn’t get a share of the advertising revenue generated in the vehicle by radio, which was usually even installed as OEM equipment. “That will change,” says Lou Brugman of Pioneer Automotive. “In-vehicle infotainment will be adding location-based social networking, which might include automatically sharing your location or estimated time of arrival with specific contacts. The excuse for being stuck in traffic might not work as easily when you’ve actually been lingering over lunch.

    Contextual Advertising Road Block. Everyone is talking about contextual location-based advertising, but it is being held back by a complicated eco-system. “There is little conformity. There are open standards and closed standards,” says Chris Peralta of Nokia. “Contextual advertising offerings are operating as separate silos.” Peralta feels that MirrorLink, previously called Terminal Mode, is getting traction. The MirrorLink Consortium is dedicated to cross-industry collaboration in developing global standards and solutions for smartphone and in-vehicle connectivity.

    Heard in the Hallways:

    “Sensors that use location will change more people’s lives than giving turn-by-turn directions faster. In the future location conferences will have nothing to do with navigation and mapping.”

    “Apple required us to add a navigation application for the iPad. We hadn’t even considered that the iPad would be used in a vehicle for navigation.”

    “People will accept dirtier data that is cheaper. Mapping that is from a user-generated community will be good enough. There will be some mapping that will sell for a premium for some uses, but map data will be commoditized.”

    “In the future, all mobile advertising will be opt-in. It won’t continue an upward trajectory if it doesn’t do otherwise.”

    Intelligence in the Cloud. The shift of information to the cloud will have a significant impact to our industry. “The cloud moves localization to a global context,” says Kanwar Chadha of CSR. “In the cloud, it becomes intelligent context and simplifies information that can feed sensors that work on low energy.” It is important to provide the right level of location accuracy for different contexts. For privacy concerns, social networking users don’t want location that is too precise; yet for mobile promotions, the closer the better. Weather can be regional for most common uses although agriculture requires precision. Having the location intelligence in the cloud enables more sensor usage.

    Smartphones and Shopping. It sounds redundant, but Google’s research indicates a heavy reliance on smartphones while shopping in brick and mortar stores. A whopping 70 percent of smartphoners use their phones as a shopping aid while inside of a store. Almost 25 percent report researching purchases on a phone, visiting a store to view merchandise, but then buying online. The benefits of mobile advertising are significant. “Hyperlocal advertising has an ROI of about 800 percent,” said Surojit Chatterjee, of Google, “Mobile ad campaigns are seeing 40 percent more calls compared to desktop.”

    I will host a free GPS World webinar on Thursday, December 1, with interesting guests.  Details will be provided in November’s Wireless Pulse.

  • In-Car Connectivity, Not a Smartphone on Wheels

    The 2011 Frankfurt Motor Show is underway. The Ford Evos concept car is having its debut and overtakes the company’s Sync offering, with a high level of social networking and connectivity features. A departure from the Sync approach of vehicles as smartphones on wheels, this plug-in hybrid is designed to always be connected to the cloud. Some of the distractibility found in the Sync has been diminished. The driver’s “personal cloud” makes automatic adjustments to music, temperature, traffic checks, and navigation that reflect learned personal choices of the driver and her schedule. Hooking a car up to the cloud comes with significant risks. Moving from stand-alone isolated in-vehicle systems to the connected network world carries the threat of being hacked and exposed to viruses. iSec researchers demonstrated unlocking and starting a car by sending text messages to its alarm system. The problem, however, is much broader than having a car stolen.

    White Flag. The industry has surrendered mobile check-in to Foursquare. It isn’t often one gets to report on a Facebook failure, but after one year of disappointing traction, the company has abandoned Places. A location-based social network offering, Facebook Places allowed users to share location at venues, and see who among their contacts were checked in nearby. When Places launched a year ago, it wasn’t clear if start-ups like Foursquare, Gowalla, and Whrrl could compete with Facebook. Yet the day following the Facebook Places launch, Foursquare sign-ups swelled with a record number of new users. Dennis Crowley of Foursquare asserts that they have captured 10 million users by “being about what people are currently doing,” while Facebook records what people have done in the past. Facebook users won’t be able to check in, but can add location to a tag.

    No More Gowalla Badges. Unable to compete with Foursquare on check-ins alone, Gowalla is shedding some of its check-in bells and whistles and adding social travel guides for travelers. These location-based communities emphasize image sharing and storytelling and are now available in 60 cities worldwide. Gowalla is also featuring content from National Geographic and other travel-oriented sites.

    Looking for Metrics. Local, location-based search is a key driver for mobile advertising. Google has 200 million active mobile map users in more than 100 countries. Navigation is search’s bosom buddy. “In general, I think you can look at navigation as a type of conversion, for example, after searching for directions,” says Suroijit Chatterjee of Goggle, as reported by The Where Business. “Better attribution models are needed, however, in order for revenue generation to develop further.”

    Fourth Amendment and Location: Law and Order Edition. In November, the Supreme Court will hear the most important fourth amendment case in years, and it is all about location. The question is whether the police need a warrant to attach a GPS device to a suspect’s vehicle and track movements. The court case arose from an investigation of a Washington man who was suspected of being part of a cocaine selling operation. The police had obtained a search warrant, but installed the tracking device one day late.

    Literary Location Judges. Recent rulings from judges across the country that have included tracking of cell phone locations have sided with protection of privacy. It is common for judges to invoke George Orwell’s 1984 and its depiction of a futuristic police state that keeps citizens under constant surveillance. In November, the Supreme Court Judges will address the specific question of whether the placement of a tracking device on a vehicle qualifies as a search, and if the surveillance by location technology is different from conventional methods such as tailing suspects and stake-outs, which do not require a warrant.

    Navv Revamps. Navv has recreated itself in the navigation industry by adding social networking into its personal navigation offering. Users can share their locations, itineraries, or current routes to their Facebook wall, directly from the app. Check-ins via Foursquare are automated. In March, the Navv navigation app was removed from the Apple App Store in a now-resolved argument with Apple over rights to the navigation app’s name.

    Mark your Calendar. Don’t miss LocNav 2011, October 18-19 in San Jose. The Where Business has co-located its annual Location Business Summit and Navigation conferences to create an even bigger show. I’ll be moderating the panel, “Connecting People Places and Things: Advertising and Social Networking in the Location Ecosystem.” My guests include executives form Expedia, Nokia, Yahoo, and A&G. See you there.

    The October issue of Wireless Pulse will be published one week later than usual to allow reporting on the LocNav show.

  • Microsoft Missteps Add to Privacy Jitters

    Microsoft is contributing to the latest location privacy jitters. Missteps by Microsoft, Apple, and Google have the potential to dampen uptake of location solutions. Microsoft published the estimated locations of millions of laptops, cell phones, and other devices with Wi-Fi connections. The location database was assembled by Microsoft’s access to Windows phones and by vehicles that drive streets and record Wi-Fi signals accessible from public roads. The data were published on Microsoft’s Live.com website.

    The problem is that Wi-Fi devices can be individually identified by a unique code, often called a MAC address. It’s not just Wi-Fi routers that can be identified. Phones and computers can be used as Wi-Fi access points, via tethering and other means, and their location can be monitored. Using the Microsoft data on Live.com, CNET tracked an HTC mobile device’s movements between house addresses in the city of Columbus, Ohio.

    Skyhook conducts similar Wi-Fi mapping, but according to Ted Morgan of Skyhook, does not provides direct access to its database. “All our partners use our client location engine, which does the scanning and lookups to our system,” says Morgan. “We don’t gather any MAC addresses of client devices, only access points and devices that act as access points.” Google collects similar location information and curbed access to the data a few months ago after a CNET article appeared. Microsoft just announced it too would now restrict access. When will these guys learn?

    Googleola Marriage. The announcement of Google’s intention to buy Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion, a heavy bucket of cash, will have repercussions throughout the industry. Google will become a mobile manufacturer in head-to-head competition with Apple and Research in Motion. For Research in Motion, maker of BlackBerry, this may be a kiss of death, unless they are snapped up by someone like Microsoft, who may feel pressured to join the game. Google will have bought itself entry into the ferocious patent lawsuit war between Motorola Mobility and Microsoft at a time when relations between Microsoft and Google had improved.

    Google’s Larry Page made assurances on the company’s blog that Android would remain an open system. “This acquisition will not change our commitment to run Android as an open platform. Many hardware partners have contributed to Android’s success and we look forward to continuing to work with all of them to deliver outstanding user experiences”. Say that as he may, other Android handset manufacturers will now be competing with the supplier of their operating software in a distribution channel tangle.

    Connected Car. The connected car, a vehicle with embedded modules and wireless services that link to the cloud and the car’s operating system, continues to evolve. The carriers are aggressively staking out territories. Verizon has shown off a car equipped with a 4G LTE modem with OnStar prototype apps. Sprint Nextel has worked with Aeris Communications to bring the Sprint network and cellular connectivity to the Hyundai connected vehicle program. AT&T has partnered with Panasonic Automotive.

    Ford has led the car manufacturers with its SYNC offering that provides hands-free, voice controlled in-car connectively. Already in 3 million vehicles, SYNC will become available on Ford’s entire passenger line-up for $295, down from its current $395.

    More than half of surveyed U.S. consumers find the concept of a connected vehicle appealing, according to a survey by Alcatel-Lucent. When it comes to opening wallets, the top applications are augmented GPS; maintenance, tracking, and notification; Wi-Fi; advanced voice features; and online environmental analysis.

    It’s not all about Smartphones. The global mobile app market for feature phones will almost double by 2016, reports Ovum. The success of smartphone apps will drive feature phone apps to a predicted $1 billion market. Feature phones outsell smart phones, but have lagged in applications uptake. The upswing should be helped by the increasing ease of developing apps and publishing them for this market.

    Personalization, not just Location. Feature phone mobile advertisements that are tailored to a consumer’s “tastes and interests” are four times more effective than offers based on location, time, or lifestyle, according to a poll of 2,000 U.S. consumers, commissioned by mobile marketing company, Upstream. The marketing activity that was found to most likely lead to a follow-up action included mobile coupons; opt-in text alert or message; an e-mail received on a mobile phone; an ad on a mobile website; or an ad that appears during an Internet search of a product or service.

    Mark your Calendar.  Don’t miss LocNav 2011 October 18-19 in San Jose. The Where Business has co-located its annual Location Business Summit and Navigation conferences to create an even bigger show. I’ll be moderating the panel, “Connecting People Places and Things: Advertising and Social Networking in the Location Ecosystem.”

  • Consumer Time on Mobile Apps Surpasses Time on Web

    The world is spinning in a new direction. Consumers are spending more time on mobile apps than on the web. In June, mobile app use overtook both mobile and desktop web, as measured by apps analytic firm Flurry. Consumers spent an average of 81 minutes per day on mobile apps, and 74 minutes on the web. App use was measured on Apple’s iOS, Android, Blackberry, and J2ME platforms, and web use was measured on the open web, mobile web, and Facebook.

    Last year, the numbers told a different story. In 2010 iOS was popular, but Android was yet to skyrocket onto the market. Web time led with 64 daily usage minutes; mobile app time lagged at 43 minutes. What are consumers doing with their apps in 2011? Having fun, or more likely, wasting time. Games and social networking categories captured the significant majority of app usage. Consumers spent nearly half their time playing games, and a third were connecting with social networking apps. Together, these two categories account for 79 percent of consumers’ total mobile app time.

    Mapping Apple. Last month I wrote that rumors of Apple’s imminent release of its own mapping database was proven wrong by its renewal of Google maps. This doesn’t mean Google isn’t hard at work on it. MacRumors reports that there are legal disclaimers found in iOS 5 in a new section called “Map Data.” A diverse list of licenses appear from third parties that provide mapping data and services. Included are CoreLogic, Getchee, Increment P Corp, Localeze, MapData Sciences, DMTI, TomTom, Urban Mapping, and Waze. Urban Mapping provides in-depth neighborhood data and Waze offers crowd-sourced real-time map and traffic data.

    Foursquare is set to start making money. Foursquare made its name as a location-based check-in community that awards mayoralships and other rewards for visiting stores and restaurants. Users share recommendations for venues. If you wondered how the company was going to bring in revenue, here’s the dope. Foursquare will team with LivingSocial and Gilt Groupe to offer location-targeted daily coupon offers, its biggest move yet to harness its consumer buzz into a long-term revenue model.

    Foursquare will leverage its location-tracking capabilities and customer data to offer deals. The depth of Foursquare’s consumer database is extensive and should give the company insight into individual perspectives and behaviors, and provide an edge in targeting offers that will grab a high conversion rate.

    LightSquared causes GPS interference. “LightSquared should not be permitted to use the L-Band spectrum for a densely-deployed, non-integrated terrestrial-only network. Such a network would cause unacceptable interference to GPS operations, wiping out an installed base of over 500 million units used in a wide array of public safety, aviation, industrial and consumer applications.” So reads the technical working group’s final report to the FCC. The group concluded that no mitigation techniques, such as using filters on GPS receivers, were considered because they don’t exist and therefore cannot be tested. The FCC is currently holding a comment period and eventually the commission will make a decision about LightSquared band use.

    Continuing to press its case, LightSquared presented the FCC with a plan to mitigate interference with GPS by using Inmarsat’s lower spectrum band, enabling reduced power of base stations by more than 50 percent. However, the working group indicated testing of this lower channel does not eliminate harmful interference to GPS receivers.

    LightSquared has argued that the issue is with GPS receivers, not their proposed system: “Despite the commercial GPS device industry’s best record to rewrite the record and obfuscate the nature of the problem, the simple fact remains that GPS receivers do not adequately reject base-station transmissions in the adjacent band.” Jim Kirkland of Trimble and the Coalition to Save our GPS responded that GPS receivers were designed against satellite transmissions with an ancillary terrestrial component, consistent with LightSquared’s initial design, but not later changes.

    Despite mounting concern of GPS interference, LightSquared recently snared $265 million in financing for its LTE network. This year LightSquared raised a total of $2.3 billion and appears close to a Sprint deal. Does LightSquared have a viable “Plan B”?

    Action-based ads. A bit more than a third of mobile ad campaigns ask subscribers to click to call, click to map, click to download, or click to SMS, reports mobile advertiser, Jumptap. The remaining ads usually invite users to a website, and aren’t as immediately actionable. Mobile ad engagement peaks at mid-day, and click through rates are at the lowest during morning commute and initial workday hours.

    Moment of Zen. When asked about the stealth in which FourSquare just raised $50 million, CEO Dennis Crowley opined, “Loose Tweets sink companies.”

  • LightSquared Prospects; FCC Chair Wants Interference Cleared, Hits Back at GPS

    LightSquared Prospects Dimming. Concerns by government and the private sector about GPS interference from LightSquared’s proposed wholesale LTE service accelerates. Government experts just reported that interference with GPS occurred in high portions of LightSquared’s spectrum bands and little in the lower spectrum. The National Space-Based PNT Advisory Board’s tests showed that some GPS receivers lost signal strength while others were fully disabled by LightSquared’s signal. FCC Chairman Genachowski, under fire for granting LightSquared a conditional waiver, has reiterated that he will not permit LightSquared to begin commercial service without first resolving concerns about potential interference to GPS devices.

    Genachowski hit back at the GPS community in a letter to Sen. Charles Grassley, “It should be no surprise to anyone involved in the LightSquared matter that the company was planning for some time to deploy a major terrestrial network in the spectrum adjacent to GPS.” Members of the National Space-Based PNT Advisory Board have stated that they and the GPS community were not properly notified when the FCC removed the limit on the number of base stations deployed on this spectrum. And so it goes on. (See also LightSquared, FCC Rebuttals Distort Record.)

    Getting Intimate. Mobile phones are the most personal computing devices. How personal? iPass conducted a study of 3,700 mobile employees at 1,000 enterprises worldwide. Sixty-one percent of these mobile workers sleep with their smartphones and 43 percent of those within arm’s reach. It gets worse. 58 percent of those that sleep with their phones at least occasionally, check it during the night. Not surprisingly, almost a third of mobile workers say their relationship with their smartphone causes friction with their partner. I’d say.

    Frienemies. In a newly extended agreement, Google will continue to provide archrival Apple with map and search capabilities. This kills rampant rumors that Apple will have a home-grown mapping database ready in the near term. In March, AppleInsider discovered an Apple job listing for an iOS Maps Application Developer to “radically improve” Apple’s location-based services. Even for Apple, a mapping database will take time to develop.

    App Stores Aren’t the Holy Grail. App developers whose marketing strategy starts and ends with getting onto app store “shelves” need a reality check. With more than 200,000 apps on Google’s Android Market and 350,000 on the Apple store, it is hard to stand out. According to Distimo, 20 percent of free applications and 80 percent of all paid applications have been downloaded less than 100 times in the Google Android Market, worldwide. Ninety-six applications have been downloaded more than 5 million times, with Google Maps the winner, with more than 50 million downloads in the Android Market.

    Traffic Targeted. Navteq will begin delivering its traffic services in Transport Protocol Expert Group (TPEG) standard format to enable location-targeted traffic services with radius search capabilities and user authentication and session management. The format allows more targeted data to be delivered in smaller file sizes.

    Mobile Advertising Flying High. Many of the location content providers are counting on monetizing with mobile advertising, and things are looking good. AdMob is receiving more than 2.7 billion mobile ad requests daily, spanning more than 80,000 mobile applications and websites. Now they are introducing ads for tablet formats. Ad Mob was purchased by Google last year for $750 million.

    Snippets

    • Nokia is ending the confusion of its dual names by killing the Ovi brand. Ovi maps, Ovi e-mail, Ovi music, Ovi store, and other Ovi products will continue to operate under the Nokia brand name.
    • Industry-backed Future of Privacy Forum is launching a new ApplicationPrivacy.org website to help developers create their own privacy policies. Location privacy concerns have so far been focused on the big players like Apple and Google, but app providers have a critical role.
    • Firefox for Android now includes a “do not track” tool that signals all web pages, images and advertisers that the user doesn’t want to be tracked.
    • Taipei officials are ordering Apple and Google to offer free seven-day mobile app trials in alignment with Taiwan’s Consumer Protection Act.
    • Google is raking in more than 97 percent of U.S. mobile search spending. Yahoo and Microsoft’s Bing share the remainder.

    Monetizing with Nothing. The Inside Virtual Goods report estimates $1.6 billion dollars was spent by game players on virtual goods last year and is predicting a 40 percent increase in 2011. There is a gender factor. MocoSpace, mobile entertainment provider, reports that although the percent of male players (53 percent) is only slightly higher than female, men account for 90 percent of all virtual goods purchased in their games. Can you lend me your sword, sir?

     

  • Location Industry Hits Speed Bump

    Location privacy issues have the power to put the skids on our industry. When I stepped into the Where 2.0 show, little did I know I was about to see Apple publicly open its kimono, reveal its location collection practices, and further fuel public and government outrage on location privacy.  Apple doesn’t stand alone as Google also stores similar data on Android devices. And in a smaller breach, TomTom’s user location data was sold to the Netherland’s government, helping  to optimize the placement of speed traps. Congress responded by hauling Apple and Google into a Congressional subcommittee meeting. Senator Patrick Leahy captured the hearing’s mood when he said, “American consumers and businesses face threats to privacy like no time before.” He went on to say that he was “deeply concerned” about the reports that iPhones and Android devices were “collecting, storing, and tracking user location data without the user’s consent.”

    Apple’s recent revelation was that its iOS operating system stores user location data in a hidden file. The location was being provided to iTunes during back-ups, giving Apple a log of a user’s movements and activities, for up to a year. A new iOS version reduces the log to a week of data and ends the back up to iTunes. The cache can be eliminated by disabling the device’s location feature.

    Leak from Google Skyhook skirmish. Larry Page, now-CEO of Google, sent an e-mail last year to top executives with the news that Motorola had chosen to use Skyhook, and not Google, location services. According to e-mails leaked to the San Jose Mercury News, Google executives responded by emphasizing the importance of collecting location data from smartphones, and the value of the data.

    “I cannot stress enough how important Google’s Wi-Fi location database is to our Android and mobile product strategy,” Google location service product manager Steve Lee wrote. “We absolutely do care about this (decision by Motorola) because we need Wi-Fi data collection in order to maintain and improve our Wi-Fi location service.”

    At the beginning of 2010, because of public concerns, Google had stopped collecting Wi-Fi data from vehicles used to capture street images for Google Maps’ Street View feature. When the vehicles also scanned an area for Google’s location database, Google admitted that in doing so, it inadvertently collected personal data from unsecured wireless networks. Google had turned to collecting location data via Android phones and the Skyhook move was seen as a major threat.  Motorola later decided to resume using Google’s location services, and Skyhook Wireless sued Google for patent infringement and interfering in its business relationship with Motorola.

    Who’s there? Location veteran Duncan McCall unveiled PlaceIQ at Where 2.0. The company provides meaning to hyper locations, categorizing the types of people, places, social, and digital activity that occurs within a city block or 100 square meters. PlaceIQ doesn’t use personal information but tries to infer information about people situated at a location. For instance, a location might be a trail head at a popular hiking destination or a tourist spot like Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco. Place IQ can identify locations in which an advertiser’s target audience has a likelihood to be present.

    Let’s make a deal. Groupon purchased location-enabled social networking company Pelago (Whrrl).  Look for Groupon to take on foursquare, which has led in social networks and local check-in market.  Groupon will move beyond being a new customer acquisition tool to adding a social platform on which a location-enhanced social community will exchange recommendations and insights on deals. A loyalty program will be added to reward check-ins and usage.  Groupon will expand beyond its current local small businesses focus to include national brands and large retailers.

    Keep your hand on your pocket. eBay wants to be your mobile wallet. The company just purchased location-based services provider Where.  Previously called uLocate, Boston-based Where develops mobile advertising, search, recommendation and daily deals services. Where will be housed in eBay’s PayPal division and used to strengthen the company’s position in mobile and hyper local shopping and deals. This fits with eBay’s earlier acquisitions of local shopping start-up Milo, barcode scanning developer RedLaser, and online retailer GSI Commerce.

    Got mail. Last month’s column highlighted indoor location and generated unprecedented mail to my inbox. I mentioned a few companies providing apps that involve indoor mapping or locations, but as many pointed out, there are more. Others include Eakahau, Ehud, Fast Mall, Geodelic, Les Quatre Temps, Point Inside, and Spotlight Mobile. I’d like to clarify that Aisle411 maps offer routing and some interactive capabilities. Choices for indoor positioning include both handset and network solutions like Wi-Fi, GPS, Bluetooth, U-TDOA, Wi-Fi,  radio frequency pattern-matching, and geo-location sensors.

    Mapping for good. Ushahidi, a non-profit organization, developed open software and interactive mapping for “crowd voicing” to increase transparency and allow people to document their condition. After the Kenyan disputed election, 45,000 users contributed information about violence and peace activities throughout the country. The platform was also used after the Haiti earthquake. Ushahidi utilizes an elite team of volunteers for coding and other important jobs. Get involved.

  • Indoor Location on the Move

    It’s coming. Indoor location, which has been stymied by the limitations of GPS and lack of mapping, is finally getting some legs and is heading us towards seamless navigation. A shopper is guided from home to an empty parking space at the mall, and the navigation doesn’t miss a beat as he heads inside and gets directions to a particular store, and perhaps to a given shelf. Today, the location of a wireless device usually cannot be determined more precisely than the building it is within. In tall or sprawling venues like arenas, malls, dormitories, or apartments this is a critical problem for emergency personnel trying to locate a person who has dialed 911. Mobile marketing and social network applications have also been constrained by problems in obtaining indoor location.

    Finding Cherries. Aisle 411 is a shopping app with local search and navigation that helps users find a particular item within a store. The app navigates to the threshold of a store and then provides a diagram of the interior (essentially a paper map) with a drawn path to the desired item, for instance, a jar of maraschino cherries. Apps like this provide a good service, but are held back by the nascent state of indoor navigation. Geo-coded locations of indoor stores often aren’t available. Apps that are more granular and attempt to locate goods within a store face greater challengers. Inventory is moved around and geo-coding is infrequent, hence the diagrams of Aisle 411. Some applications like Aisle 411 utilize crowd-sourced maps, in addition to venue-provided maps.

    Height Counts. Products are being introduced to determine the elusive “z” plane, or in layman’s terms, height. Location systems work well at determining the “x” and “y” axis but can’t distinguish between a location on the first floor and one on the twentieth floor. Polaris is releasing an indoor location offering in the second half of this year. In addition to Polaris’ existing location technology, the solution also uses femtocell and distributed antennas without necessitating a client on the handset. Polaris can distinguish a position within a range of five floors. Infrastructure provider CommScope introduced GeoLENS Indoor, a solution that integrates with wireless indoor coverage systems including distributed antenna systems (DAS), repeaters, and other RF equipment.

    Inside Job. Micello, a small start-up, has been addressing the indoor mapping issue. The free Micello app contains the maps of the insides of large structures including shopping malls, airports, hospitals, and business campuses. So far, Micello has mapped 215,545 structures in 2,200 locations.

    3D Indoors. Navteq showed off Destination Maps’ indoor navigation system at the International CTIA Wireless 2011 show, held in Orlando March 22-24 . The maps are available in 200 U.S. shopping malls and provide detailed 3D guidance and information within indoor structures. The system will use transmitters within buildings that communicate via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.

    Monster in the Room. Mobile users aren’t satisfied by industry privacy measures. “About half the people in a study of 1,500 consumers we interviewed are concerned about who knows their location, particularly businesses,” says Kristi Crum of Verizon. Subscribers want to understand how their data is being used, whether is it being aggregated, or if it is being shared personally or kept totally private. It will only take one or two high-profile events involving misuse of data before there is fallout on our industry, warns Crum.

    Monetize, Monetize, Monetize. Mobile payment systems will become ubiquitous. Google is collaborating with MasterCard and Citigroup to embed contactless near-field communication (NFC) payment technologies in Android. Financial service companies are becoming players in mobile advertising and will likely provide advertising networks like Google with consumer data that will enable more targeted advertising. Google is starting a pilot in New York and San Francisco and is paying for thousands of point-of-sales readers for stores in the regions. Google will go head-to-head against ISIS, a nationwide mobile commerce NFC venture that includes Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile. ISIS plans to introduce services within the next 18 months.

    GPS Interference Concerns Grow. The Department of Defense and the Department of Transportation have added their voices to concerns over LightSquared’s hybrid satellite-terrestrial LTE network, which they think may interfere with GPS systems. In a letter to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, the agencies state they were “not sufficiently included” in the development of LightSquared’s initial work plan to address potential GPS interference issues caused by its network. An FCC spokesman tried to ease concerns by indicating that LightSquared will not be permitted to go forward until potential GPS interference issues are addressed.

    At CTIA, LightSquared acted as though there were no hurdles in its way. CEO Sanjiv Ahuja asserted that the company will beat its build-out goals with a commitment to cover 100 million POPs by the end of 2012, 145 million by the end of 2013, and 260 million by the end of 2015. “We are not only committed to meeting these milestones, we are today positioned to exceed them,” Ahuja said.

    DoCoMo. There was a large empty space where Japan’s NTT DoCoMo’s CTIA booth would have stood. DoCoMo issued a statement that it was skipping CTIA to focus fully on delivery of mobile services for relief efforts. In the bare exhibit space, a solitary vase stood filled with cherry blossoms.

  • Beyond Hyper-Local and Location Enhanced

    Be all you can be. Being location enabled or “hyper local” isn’t enough. Mobile applications are also trying to increase discoverability, push into Group-On couponing territory, and proactively deliver more relevant recommendations to users. Loopt announced limited-time and perishable inventory deals to users within proximity. Google has introduced an “open now” filter to local mobile search to find nearby businesses that are open. Not content to focused on their core check-in business (“I am the proud mayor of Barney’s Beanery”), foursquare is now recommending places near you, based on previous check-in activities, user profiles, and what your friends like. On the foursquare blog, Dennis Crowley suggests “You’ll be surprised by what you get when searching for really specific things, like ‘’80s music,’ ‘fireplaces,’ ‘pancakes,’ ‘bratwurst,’ and ‘romantic’.” Evenings with Crowley must be, well, surprising. Very.

    Mass geo shopping. It is large-scale and geo-specific and, most interestingly, it comes from a carrier. AT&T and Placecast together launched ShopAlerts. AT&T subscribers can opt in and receive offers, rewards, and coupons based on each individual’s geolocation. AT&T will create geofences (virtual geographic perimeters) around retailers, events, or geographic areas to optimize relevancy. This isn’t so different than what some of the location-enabled social network applications (Booyah!, foursquare, Loopt) are doing, but it is significant because of the scale and reach that a carrier brings.

    Making money? Ever since Google offered free mobile navigation and others app providers followed suit, content providers have struggled to find ways to monetize their applications. Many have looked to mobile advertising for revenue. But mobile advertising hasn’t developed quite as fast as many predicted, although it is still a growing and big market. Apple’s iAD mobile advertising efforts have been a disappointment. Industry insiders say iAD fill rates have fallen to less than 10 percent and Apple has halved its minimum advertising purchase to $500,000.

    In-app money tree. Transactions that occur within an application are making big money for application developers. For both free and premium apps, in-app transactions now equal 49 percent of iPhone developer income and 29 percent of iPad revenue, according to analytics firm Disitmo. This is useful for the person who may buy a navigation app and wants to upgrade to real-time traffic. Now users don’t need to be referred outside the application to a website to make the transaction. Apple and Google both recently announced in-app subscription platforms. Apple has created a firestorm by demanding 30 percent of in-app subscription fees. Google takes 10 percent.

    How much for the sword? It is jaw dropping. In-app purchases of virtual goods is overtaking advertising in top categories on the Apple platform. Flurry Analytics reports that in certain Apple app categories, “During 2010 revenue increasingly shifts from advertising to virtual goods sales until reaching a proportion of more than 80 percent from virtual goods.” You may be asking, ‘What is a virtual good?’ A gamer may want a virtual lightsaber, mansion, or respect points to enhance the game experience. My advice is to spend the wad on respect points.

    By a smidge, the winner is… Android took over RIM’s long-time run as king of smartphones. Devices that run Google’s Android operating system have taken the lead in the U.S., according to new data from The Nielsen Company. Now Android is the front runner in the U.S. smartphone market with 29 percent share, with Apple’s iOS and Rim’s BlackBerry both at 27 percent. Windows lags at 10 percent, but watch Android’s lead fatten. The much-anticipated Verizon iPhone hasn’t had the impact on Apple sales once imagined. Nielsen also reports that subscribers between the ages of 25 and 34 account for 27 percent of all U.S. smartphone users across all platforms.

    Threat to GPS. You may be following the very serious interference issue that threatens the GPS signal. LightSquared is developing high wireless bandwidth capabilities (4G-LTE) for wireless operators. LightSquared received an unnervingly fast-tracked FCC conditional waiver that permits it to broadcast a new terrestrial broadband service from 1,500-watt terrestrial transmitters. This will be in the portion of the L Band that is immediately adjacent to the band used by GPS. The FCC waiver was required as LightSquared’s FCC license only extended to dual-mode phones, but LightSquared wants to offer the option of terrestrial-only, hence the waiver. According to industry experts, the LightSquared terrestrial broadband signal is about 1 billion times the received power of the GPS signal on Earth. This may result in wide-scale GPS interference and jamming worldwide. As a result of ensuing uproar, a working group conducted by LightSquared and the U.S GPS Industry Council was formed to study the issue.

    Upward bound. FCC chairman Julius Genachowski has had his hands full in the fight of network neutrality and the creation of a national broadband plan. Now there are rumors, not quiet ones either, that he may be nominated by President Obama to be the next Secretary of Commerce.

    Next stop, Orlando for CTIA.

  • Smartphones Take on PCs: Significant Historical Moment

    It is a significant first, an iconic moment, a big deal. You will want to remember where you were when you heard that smartphones started to outsell personal computers. According to a report by market research company IDC, consumer electronics makers shipped 100.9 million smartphones worldwide in the last three months of 2010, an 87 percent jump from a year earlier. PC shipments didn’t do as well, edging up just three percent to 92.1 million. The falling prices of smartphones have contributed to this trend. The numbers are skewed by the longer life of a computer compared to a smartphone, which frequently is replaced within two years. For many of us, one doesn’t supplant the need for the other.

    Are car companies and content providers allowed to wed? At the Navigation Strategies, USA, conference, it was a striking new world with the automotive industry anxious to engage with application providers. Some of the interesting tweetable snippets from leading automotive and content providers:

    • “There is a three year development cycle with automotive. But now you can integrate an app into a vehicle in four weeks.”
    • “Maps used to an end onto itself, but now it is a way to organize information.”
    • “People will pay for connectivity in the vehicle, but may only be willing to pay during the time when it is needed.”
    • “People will pay for traffic, but you need to educate them on what it has done for them. This month you saved x money in gas, this amount of time navigating around traffic.”
    • “No one needs a map for their commute. They need their alarm clock to wake them early when their commute route is congested.”
    • “Content providers can only avoid the ‘free monster’ with value added services.”
    • “Navigation is now about smartphones and how to integrate with the car.”

    Augment my reality. I’m not the only one charmed by Wikitude (no, not WikiLeaks) from Austrian-based Mobilizy. I took a walk around a hotel parking lot with Wikitude’s Philipp Breuss-Schneeweis imagining the possibilities of Wikitude Drive, augmented-reality navigation for vehicles or pedestrians. Intended as a heads-up display, it is currently shown as a smartphone mounted on a dashboard that displays the scene ahead of you, exactly as you see it with your eyes. However, the navigation route is drawn on top of the real scene. There is an option, particularly important at night, to switch out of augmented reality to see the route as a street map. Wikitude Drive was the grand prize winner of the 2010 NAVTEQ Global LBS Challenge. World Browser, another product by Wikitude, identifies objects around you. Point your phone and it will (try to) identify your surroundings, such as landmarks, mountains, or buildings.

    Location-based social networks. I recently hosted a webinar on location-based social networks (LBSN). It is a hot topic: I had registrants from 42 countries. LBSNs are mobile apps based on developing a social community that broadcasts a user’s location and other content. LBSNs have an element of gaming that fuels and rewards usage, helps people find their friends or make new friends that share the same interest and proximity, and often provide offers and coupons from brands. A hallmark of many of these applications are check-ins, which is a manual or automated process of letting one’s community know one’s location: “I’m at Frankie’s Pizza.” There are too many LBSNs to list, but they include Booyah!, Whrrl, foursquare, Gowalla, SCVNGR. If you are interested, the webinar is available for download.

    My webinar guests were Brian Cho of Booyah!, maker of MyTown, and Chad Reed of Pelago, maker of Whrrl. MyTown is an LBSN game that proves the concept with 3.7 million users. Sessions average 55 minutes a day and at its peak had 1.1 million daily sessions. Advertisers drop items into the game that may depend on the player’s location and sometimes a clue cannot be unlocked without a visit to a retail location. MyTown drove more than 800,000 visits to H&M, a clothing retailer.

    Wirrl focuses on building affinity societies, and currently has 5,000 special interest societies, such as mountain biking, the Red Bull Society, and Mexican food lovers. Society members make recommendations to other members of their affinity group and a sophisticated algorithm builds up individual preferences. Whrrl’s revenue comes from brands that offer contests and prizes that match society members’ interests and locations. Reed says they use contests, instead of coupons or offers, to allow brands to control costs and add excitement.

    Making money. I’m often asked for advice from content providers on making money when consumers are increasingly expecting applications to be free, and some applications, such as navigation or mapping, are getting dangerously close to becoming a utility. One strategy is to add value in a way that is challenging for other companies to cookie cut. An example is Navx, a company based in Paris that provides fuel prices for up to 100,000 gas stations with hourly updates. Consolidating the data isn’t a fully automated process so it is unlikely that companies like Google, or the like, will want to get their hands dirty. Navx also identifies parking spaces, speed traps, and charging stations for electric vehicles.

    Probe sharing. Adding live connectivity to enable traffic and other services is critical for personal navigation device (PND) providers that are competing for market with smartphones. The recently announced TomTom GO 2505 is stepping up with improved traffic (updated every two minutes) from probe and traditional sources, as well as local search, fuel prices, and weather. TomTom is anxious to get its users hooked and is providing a 12-month trial subscription out of the box. Part of the traffic data set is provided by its own users, and Tom Murray of TomTom reports that more than 90 percent of its customers opt-in to contribute the data.

    The World Mobile Conference is under way. It’s looking like it is all about smartphones and tablets. More later.