Finding a location in a foreign country or any of the Indian cities or even getting lost in your own town are instances people encounter often. However, gone are the days when the only option to reach your destination was by asking a stranger for directions or letting notorious Indian taxi drivers take you for a ride. Enter the world of GPS, where finding your way is a childs play, and its a lot of fun using it too. In fact, there is a joke doing the rounds that people deliberately get lost just to use their GPS-enabled devices.

On a more serious note, GPS as a technology is revolutionizing the navigation space like never before, the proof of which comes from the nascent but growing adoption of GPS services in India. Once an exclusivity of the developed world, GPS is increasingly becoming common-place in emerging geographies like India.

Market Dynamics
According to estimates, the global GPS devices market is estimated at an excess of $4 bn in 2007. Some major players globally include Trimble, Leica Geosystems, SiRF, and CSI Wireless. Meanwhile, industry estimates pegged the Indian market size at $22 mn in 2006 with a potential to reach $448 mn by 2012. The main drivers of this growth would be the logistics vertical, which will heavily use GPS for tracking. Apart from that, individual consumers and car navigation systems are also supposed to drive the market in terms of revenue.

The concept of digital maps did not exist in the past in India, and despite the IT boom, paper maps claimed its dominance. But the scenario changed when commercial applications of satellites manifested in the form of GPS. In India, though the GPS market is still emerging, it has started generating interest among the larger section. Till 2004, there was little consumer awareness about the value of digital maps and location-based services. With the launch of mapping and directions portals like MapmyIndia.com in September 2004, in India, followed by the worldwide launch of Google Earth depicting satellite imagery in 2005, and then Yahoo India Maps in 2006 (powered by MapmyIndia maps), consumers realized the benefits of being able to search for maps and directions easily, print customized route maps with turn-by-turn directions, and then carry it with them. With MapmyIndia providing store locator services (the nearest store, and how to get services) to leading banks and car companies such as ICICI, HDFC, Hyundai, etc, digital maps are becoming a high utility tool, as consumers can locate their nearest service center/dealer/ATM and save time also.

Reflecting on this, Rohan Verma, head, Engineering, and director, Marketing, MapmyIndia.com, says, GPS navigation as a market has been around in India for a couple of years now, but started taking off last year. The reason for this was that sub-par products were introduced in the market, powered by poor quality maps.

In the last one year, the GPS market has seen some positive moves. For instance, Airtels launch of GPS navigation on Blackberry in June 2007, powered by MapmyIndia.com, and the launch of MapmyIndia Navigator, an in-car GPS navigation device for all over India, has helped improve customer perception of the quality and benefits of these kinds of products. According to market intelligence reports, the vehicle-tracking segment alone is forecast to reach Rs 140 to Rs 200 crore in the next two years.

Big Guys in the Game
There are a couple of prominent players in the GPS arena in India. Hyderabad-based SatNav Technologies has got an early mover advantage by virtue of a slew of GPS solutions. Says Amit Prasad, managing director and founder CEO, SatNav Technologies, SatNav Technologies took an early lead, and indeed we are the pioneers of GPS technology in India. We were the first to provide the consumer with maps in 1999, when there were no proper maps in the country and GPS was unheard of. We launched our first product in 2005, and all our services have been very well received since then.

"GPS navigation as a market has been around in India but couldnt take-off because of sub-par products powered by poor quality maps Rohan Verma, head, Engineering and Marketing director, MapmyIndia.com	The deployment of GPS in our operations has given us a distinct edge in proactively managing our fleet. The benefits are tremendous GS Ravikumar, CIO, Gati	We took the early lead in GPS and are pioneers in this space in India Amit Prasad, managing director & founder CEO, SatNav Technologies

Recently, SatNav has also launched SatGuide turn-by-turn navigation and planning solution for laptops and desktops targeted at the corporates. The company is positioning SatGuide as a first of its kind efficiency enhancement and planning tool in the country. The application includes turn-by-turn navigation and routing software bundled with One India map of SatGuide that covers all major cities of India along with a detailed national/state highway network; all included in a single map. Sitting in the luxury of ones office, it is now possible to feed-in a start-point and an end-point, and get details like distance, time to travel, etc.

For hardware, SatGuide has partnered with one of the worlds leading hardware manufacturer of GPS devices, Mio Technologies. In addition, SatGuide works on any Windows OS mobile phones, laptops and PDAs.

Meanwhile, MapmyIndia is another leading GPS player in the country. It offers GPS services for both in-car and mobile phones. The companys Navigator is an award-winning portable, in-car GPS navigation device, functional pan-India. Says Rohan Verma: This product is targeted at those who want GPS navigation while driving or traveling in their car. These kinds of PNDs (portable navigation devices) offer a much richer user experience with their large screens, dedicated navigation features, and sleek color touch screens with the added benefit of in-car entertainment by playing movies and music.

MapmyIndia also has the iNav series GPS navigation software for mobile phones. This product is targeted at those who do not want to invest in another GPS device, but have GPS navigation on their mobile phones. According to company sources, iNav allows Indian consumers to experience high quality GPS navigation with minimal investment and ease of use. In addition, MapmyIndia.com offers free Internet maps, directions and local search portal, allowing anyone with Internet access to freely search for maps, directions and tourist and business places anywhere in India.

Growth Outlook
According to experts, because the GPS market is on the verge of stagnation in the West, vendors are developing GPS-based services for emerging geographies like India. Tracking and navigation are the two leading apps that will gain further credence in India. Vehicle-tracking systems are poised to grow at a rapid pace, with aggressive deployment by logistics companies. Take the case of Gati, one of Indias leading logistics players, which already has more than hundred intercity trucks enabled with GPS, and plans are on the anvil to equip around 1,000 intercity fleet with GPS.

Says GS Ravikumar, CIO, Gati: The deployment of GPS in our operations has given us a distinct edge in proactively managing our fleet. The benefits are tremendous. Clearly, Gati is one of the few logistics companies known for proactively deploying IT in their operations. While Gati is the only Indian logistics company to have deployed GPS, many companies are expected to follow suit, as it has huge benefits.

But despite the benefits of GPS, in an India context, there are certain inhibitors that might slow down the adoption. Primarily, there is a lack of awareness and the cost of GPS devices is high. Hence, mostly consumer-driven GPS through mobile phones rather than pure GPS navigation devices are popular. Says Amit Prasad of SatNav: The biggest inhibitor is the general mindset of the people, but its rapidly changing. Yet another major deterrent is the import duty imposed on these devices. It is about 34%. If the duty is reduced, we will see a major reduction in price.

GPS in India is still in a nascent stage. Many experts believe that the coming two years are promising for the market with cellular handset players like Nokia, Asus, HTC, service providers like Airtel, GPS device players like Gramin, and solution providers like SatNav and MapmyIndia eyeing the Indian GPS market more aggressively. What this means is that more apps are on the anvil leading to more people buying GPS devices and using services. The outlook for GPS looks promising.

Shrikanth G
shrikanthg@cybermedia.co.in

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