Vodafone ups ante in mobile GPS war

by Alex Zaharov-Reutt

Monday, 03 December 2007

Page 1 of 3 ! The race to offer compelling new features to a mobile phones by manufacturers and new services by the phone companies to attract and keep customers is adding up to an explosion of new features and technologies as standard, with GPS a new battleground. Although it has been possible to connect some smartphones to a portable Bluetooth GPS receiver for some time now, alongside mobile phones that simply have GPS receivers built-in as standard, Vodafone is making an all-out effort to transform GPS into a must-have service that anyone can use – in the car or walking around. They’re doing this by offering a range of GPS-equipped phones and smartphones with Bluetooth that can wirelessly connect to a Bluetooth GPS receiver which are loaded with Vodafone’s own GPS navigation software, Vodafone Compass – with a few nifty features up their sleeve to differentiate from standalone GPS devices and other telcos. What Vodafone have just launched is a “GPS Navigation Pack” that brings the Compass service to a range of Nokia and BlackBerry smartphones which don’t have a GPS module built-in. The pack includes a Motorola Bluetooth GPS receiver which looks like a ‘hockey puck’ at around 60mm in diameter, with an attachable clip for your car’s sun visor, your belt or bag, and a universal windscreen suction phone holder, along with a cigarette-lighter adapter mini-USB tipped charging cable to keep the GPS charged, and all you need it do is pair it with a compatible Nokia or Blackberry on a post-paid account from Vodafone to use the pre-loaded Compass software. The service was demonstrated to the media today at Circular Quay, with one highlight being the ability to set the GPS navigation directions for walking mode, as we walked from one destination to the next guided by the phone’s on screen map and the Motorola GPS puck. The service worked, although we learned that it’s important to ensure you have selected walking mode, which will take you there more directly than driving mode which naturally assumes you are in a car, otherwise you will potentially be walking a much longer route! The Compass software was created in conjunction with Yapp, an Australian mapping company, with the first fruit of this labour was a Vodafone branded Blackberry’s GPS equipped model with the first version of Compass installed, launched in September ’07. The service worked as advertised and gave Blackberry users a locally developed GPS service that would progressively be upgraded with new features. Ongoing new features and improvements, along with being able to build a network that can be supplemented by user submitted data, is one of the advantages of creating your own navigation software on your own phone network and connected to your own data centre – you are responsible for its feature set, what it offers, and how it evolves, and how you can have the database improved by your own users. Vodafone’s Compass software has come a long way since the first version in September 07, and has now been optimised to work on selected Nokia and Blackberry models, with more to come in the future. Continued on page 2... << First page <   1 2 3 Next page > Last page - Post your comment >>

 

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