Flaunting
your sleek cellphone? Forget it. The next big thing is the PND,
portable navigation device for the uninitiated. Indian companies are
geared to sell the machines that will help you to find your way by
linking your position on the earth to tracking satellites and
sophisticated software-linked maps through the global positioning
system (GPS).
GPS-enabled cellphones have been there in the market for quite a
while now, but standalone PNDs at relatively affordable prices are also
hitting the market. Service providers hope to marry social networking
with GPS to make more money.
Simply put, you can hope to
discover friends not far from you, because software and Internet will
match your locations and interests.
“While navigation may be a good start for GPS in India, the service
would gain ground with services built around social networking,” says
Ashutosh Pande, managing director of SiRF Technlogies, which makes
microchips and software for GPS.
Models like Nokia N95, Nokia E90, BlackBerry 8800, BlackBerry 8820
and BlackBerry 8830 (on Airtel) are GPS-enabled. The BlackBerry 8800
has Google maps on which turn-by-turn navigation is not possible but
you can plot a route between two locations. However, the 8830 has maps
from MapMyIndia.com that allow turn-by-turn navigation.
“Most people would probably use GPS for their first time on their
cellphones but once they realise the need for better quality of
experience they would graduate to a PND,”says Ramesh Kashyap, General
Manager, GPS India, which sells PNDs made by US-based GPS device firm
Garmin International.
Garmin is expected anytime to release PNDs priced in the range of
Rs. 15,000 to 40,000.The company had earlier pulled out its devices
because there is a 36 per cent import duty and also confusion over
security-sensitive maps of Indian cities.
Importing a GPS chip, like that made by SiRF Technologies ,attracts
only four per cent import duty but then there are no PND vendors
manufacturing in India. By December 2008, India could expect portable
navigation devices to cost less than Rs 5,000 (they cost Rs 21,000
upwards) while the same will be possible in the US by this Christmas,
industry officials say.
MapMyIndia, a part of CE Info Systems that deals with navigation
services, recently launched a Delphi navigator with preloaded
maps of 18 Indian cities and almost 4,00,000 points of interest (such
as restaurants, petrol pumps, ATMs, hospitals etc.). The navigator lets
you play music, watch videos, view pictures and navigate as a matter of
chance and costs Rs 21,000. The company has 200 surveyors on the
ground updating maps.
Rohan Verma, MapMyIndia’s, expects to sell around a 1,00,000 units of the unit in India.
Globally, the market is hotting up. A few days ago, Nokia announced
a $8.1 billion acquisition of GPS firm Navteq, while PND vendor Tom Tom
has tied up with TeleAtlas.