23 May 2008

Garmin Launches First Salvo
In War Against Nokia Maps

Mobile analysts have recently predicted location based services will see the greatest amount of growth in the mobile data industry.

Mobile corporations were evidently listening, and have already begun making moves to secure portions of that new industry. The biggest initial salvo for most mobile corporations will be GPS enabled navigation services.

Nokia's recent corporate acquisitions of leading cartography and navigation companies has culminated in the greatest of these location based services to date, which has been Nokia Maps.

More than just software, the Maps service includes travel guides, realtime updated maps, points of interests, and traffic information, plus the expected turn by turn navigation, and more. It has been the only service of its kind, and was relatively pricey, but the features and capabilities, not to mention the required S60 platform, gave it unprecedented advantages.

The biggest complaint amongst Nokia Maps users is the price for a license, and the length of validity for that license. Nokia has only issued licenses for Nokia Maps for limited periods. They even ended their 3 year license offer, instead favoring shorter license agreements maxing out at 1 year. This has incensed Nokia users almost across the board, but no package of similar scope and service had existed up until then, so they might have been justified in keeping the usage rights so limited for the price, and users had no option but to pay for the temporary license.

But this is a business, and in business, competition always rears its head. And with no surprise, the first volley comes from navigation hardware leader and software giant Garmin. Apparently, Garmin has reached an agreement with RIM to supply its next generation Blackberry with Garmin supplied navigation software and services. The most exciting news in the recent press release is Garmin's decision to offer its Blackberry users a lifetime license for only $99. This is competitive with the price of Nokia Maps' annual license.

Nokia users are no stranger to Garmin's wares, with Garmin XT having a large Symbian OS following. In fact, once Nokia's short term pricing structure for a Maps 2.0 license was discovered, many Symbian users defected to Garmin's more than acceptable software offering for the S60 platform.

With everything comes change, and now may be time for Nokia to reconsider its pricing strategy. No longer a lone service provider, competition and consumers may dictate how much is enough or too much for navigation service. Garmin feels it should have a say as well, and its recent press release will surely stir the pot. The RIM platform, though limited, is growing, has a large following in global, especially American, corporate circles, and with new improved devices recently announced, looks to be a fierce competitor in both handset and LBS revenue. I doubt Nokia will continue to lay dormant, and their response will be eagerly awaited. They've invested too much to be dethroned as the leader in this market.

(It should be noted that Garmin's Blackberry service will NOT allow offline map data, and may require an unlimited data plan as well, so there are other included costs and limitations. However, most smartphone users have this already, so that may be relative.)

To read the official Garmin press release, see the link below:
http://www8.garmin.com/pressroom/mobile/051508.html