As the popularity of navigation and mapping applications on mobile phones continues to increase consumers may be encouraged to sell their old phones and upgrade to a mobile compatible with app technology.
The issue of navigation and mapping packages has been a hot topic of discussion at the Mobile World Congress show held in Barcelona. Tim Shephard of industry consultants Canalys said: “Navigation on phones was an industry, now it is an application, an application for free.”
Mapping applications on mobile phones could be seen as a suitable substitute for consumers considering purchasing sat-navs. Particularly with Nokia offering their Ovi maps services for free, which has reportedly seen more than 3 million people download.
According to research carried out by Canalys, approximately 27 million people worldwide had GPS navigation on their mobile phones at the end of 2009. Nokia have estimated that they hope to boost that figure to 50 million by offering the service for free.
Demand for the new breed of smartphones is on the rise because of all the mobile applications that can run on these devices. Navigation and maps powered by Google are key applications on these phones.
Consumers who are interested in taking advantage of the services on offer from a navigation app could consider trading in their old handsets and using the cash to go towards the purchasing of a smartphone, such as the recently nominated Smartphone of the Year and Gadget of the Year (2010 Engadget Awards) Nokia N900.
