This is great. There is obvioulsy a large market for this service and to be in in from the beginning is a definite advantage. All I can say is WOW.
With some money and marketing behind us we have a huge winner.
INSTANT MAPPING
Lost? Ask your cellphone where you are
By Grace Casselman
Financial Post
nationalpost.com
Do you need travel directions? Do you want to find the nearest bank machine? Are you looking for the closest Italian restaurant? Just ask your cellphone.
Indeed, Bell Mobility, working with San Diego-based NeoPoint Inc., is currently running a trial of "location-based technology" that will pinpoint the location of a cellphone to provide services to customers, including directions to pertinent services such as cash machines or fine dining.
"Services such as mapping for tourists — both pedestrian and motorized — may prove popular," says Jordan Worth, telecommunications manager for IDC Canada in Toronto. "As well, enabling people to quickly find restaurants, banks, major landmarks and the like makes a lot of sense. On the business side, salespeople could obviously benefit from having information about clients that are in their proximity."
About 50 users are testing the service, which is an extension of Bell Mobility's Mobile Browser service and is currently available for digital cellphone users in Ontario and Quebec (although the company plans to roll that out to major markets across Canada by year-end). That Mobile Browser enables e-mail and offers access to news and information services, plus e-commerce opportunities through services such as Amazon.com and HMV.com.
Kevin Thorton, senior vice-president and general manager for NeoPoint, says many cellphone companies are experimenting with providing users services based on location. "One complaint is you have to tell the service where you are. It's very inconvenient to have to type in an exact location," Mr. Thorton says. With the NeoPoint system, the technology handles all that. The customers are equipped with the specialized NeoPoint 1000 screen phone that has an 11-line display screen. NeoPoint also provides the information portal called myAladdin.com, as well as the location-based technology. Participants have a Global Positioning System (GPS) that plugs into a car's cigarette lighter, although subsequent versions will be smaller and will attach directly to the phone. That GPS technology can find a user within about 30 metres, says Mr. Thorton. However, other users are testing NeoPoint location technology that works by triangulating between cell towers to find a user within about a kilometre.
While Mr. Thorton says GPS solutions will likely be most popular for fleet-tracking applications, consumers will not want to buy a GPS unit just to have more services available on their cell phones. He says within a couple of years, GPS technology will be built directly into cellphones, adding that, "Instead of waiting, we're taking advantage of what we have right now."
Commercial rollout at Bell Mobility of such location-based technology is slated for mid-2001, says Norm Silins, director of data services and e-commerce for Bell Mobility in Mississauga, Ont.
Meanwhile, customer feedback is being studied on such matters as: How specific does the location have to be to be relevant? Mr. Silins says early results show customers want the results to be fairly exact.
While wireless carriers in North America are eyeing the opportunities associated with providing location-based services to users of mobile phones, a great deal of research is being driven by a U.S. Federal Communications Commission directive aimed at improving 911 emergency service.
By the fall of 2001, wireless carriers will be required to precisely locate cellphone users when they dial 911.
That way, users can be reached with the necessary help, even if they do not know exactly where they are. The requirement for such capability ties in with the carriers' desire to provide enhanced services for competitive advantage.
In the meantime, companies must seriously consider such issues as privacy and confidentiality of data about user locations.
"You have to be very careful with what you do with that information," says Mr. Thorton. "The privacy concerns are something we're taking very seriously."
During the trial, consumers choose when they want to turn on the service. When the technology is officially launched, he says users will be able to choose to never have the capability activated, to always have it activated, or to choose when to activate it. "All of the control is in the hand of the user," says Mr. Thorton.
While wireless location technology holds a great deal of potential on the customer service side, IDC's Mr. Worth notes: "Location services hold both great promise for delivering relevant information and a potential threat to one's privacy."
Financial Post |
