The use of mobile mapping and direction services across Europe increased by 68pc in the year to February 2010, according to comScore’s MobiLens survey.
In February, more than 21m mobile users aged 13 or older in the EU5 countries (UK, France, Germany, Spain and Italy) used their mobile handsets for navigation.
The highest growth among the five countries was seen in the UK market, with an 86pc increase to 5.7m mobile map users. Italy remains the second-largest market for mobile mapping and direction services with 4.9m users, but has experienced the least growth (53pc) compared with a year ago. Germany ranked third with 3.9m mobile map users, followed by France (3.5m) and Spain (3.1m).
Among those who accessed maps via their mobile devices for the three-month period ending February 2010, most (68.2pc) accessed those services in a car or other vehicle. Just over a third (35.3pc) of total users accessed the services while using public transport and 27pc said they did so while walking, running or cycling.
Mobile subscribers using handsets with advanced positioning technology – assisted GPS (A-GPS) – are more than eight percentage points more likely (71.7pc) to use maps in a vehicle than those without (63.9pc).
“The higher incidence of A-GPS usage in cars suggests that the superior speed and precision in these devices are being used for more than just identifying locations – they are being used as full in-car navigation systems,” said comScore senior analyst Alistair Hill.
Location-based advertising
“That these services offer similar functionality to premium services without the significant price tag has certainly contributed to their early success,” he said. “Mobile mapping services also have potential for integration with other location aware services, such as mobile social networking applications that provide links to friends and insights on surroundings and, subsequently, offer great promise for the location-based advertising market.”
Article courtesy of Businessandleadership.com
