Laurent Vermot-Gauchy wants to introduce a new acronym into the location services market-ELS, or enterprise location-centric services.
As head of location-services company Maporama, Vermot-Gauchy is looking to sell location information and services to the business market. And Maporama is not alone in its focus on the enterprise market; indeed, it’s the only avenue left for several location-services companies that failed to break into the wireless carrier market.
“There’s been a major shift,” said Sal Dhanani, senior director of marketing for location application company Televigation Inc.
Dhanani said the focus of the LBS market in past years was to sell technology directly to wireless carriers, which then would rebrand it as their own and offer it to their subscribers. The Federal Communications Commission’s E911 mandate, requiring wireless carriers to implement LBS technology, fueled the market activity around location services. However, little movement has been made in the location services market in the United States, and only AT&T Wireless Services Inc. and Verizon Wireless offer branded location applications.
Carriers “don’t necessarily want to be the one to take the application to market,” Dhanani said.
The dearth of carrier interest has forced several location-services companies to change gears in an attempt to scope out potential customers. The search has led to the wide-open enterprise market.
For example, MapInfo Corp. has worked for years to sell its technology to wireless carriers but has so far met with little success. The situation spurred the company to look further down the road for potential customers by refocusing on the enterprise market. And it seems the strategy has met with some success.
For instance, MapInfo helped MasterCard create its wireless ATM Locator for Telus Mobility in Canada. MapInfo said the service helps MasterCard set itself apart from its competitors and gives Telus additional service revenues from users.
Maporama charted a similar path. The company started in 2000 with the intent of becoming the MapQuest for the European market, offering Internet-based location information to Web surfers. But the company quickly morphed into an “enterprise solutions provider,” Vermot-Gauchy said, by offering a variety of location services to businesses. Maporama sells technology to help enterprises eliminate non-productive travel, optimize itineraries and locate suppliers. The company has deals with several European Web sites as well as with automotive company Delphi in the United States.
“With the way things developed in the LBS space, we saw an opportunity in the business-to-business sector,” said Televigation’s Dhanani.
Televigation once sought to sell its technology directly to carriers so they could rebrand it as their own. That opportunity didn’t materialize, Dhanani said, which caused Televigation to take its applications straight to the user. The company operates a free WAP-based location service through Sprint PCS and counts about 100,000 users. The company also recently launched its own TeleNav Java-based application through Nextel Communications Inc. Televigation also plans to offer BREW-based location applications, as well as a TeleNavTrack application for small to medium-sized business, allowing them to track assets and mobile workers.
“We haven’t shut any doors,” Dhanani said.
“The move that you see toward the enterprise is because they have specific verticals,” said Steve Roskowski, vice president of marketing for Dynamicsoft. The company provides Internet protocol-based infrastructure for data services, including location-based services.
Roskowski said businesses usually have specific needs for location information, which makes building products much easier. Carriers on the other hand have a much broader set of problems, making location services much more complicated.
“The LBS market is definitely here,” said Televigation’s Dhanani. “It’s growing very rapidly.”
