Around this time last year I was researching the ‘Navigation & Location Europe’ conference and I was speaking to lots of LBS application developers who were telling me one thing: They wanted more support from mobile operators. This essentially came down to two points – with the lack of GPS enabled phones on the market they wanted easy and unrestricted access to Cell ID information. But, moreover, they wanted much greater help from operators when it came to promoting and getting their applications to market.

I came across some really interesting news today as huge silicon valley venture capital fund Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers has set up a $100 million ‘iFund’ to invest in companies building applications for the iPhone.

What an exciting week for location news. Since I arrived back from the Navigation & Location Europe conference in Amsterdam it’s been all go for Nav&Loc!

 

Garmin recently announced: "Garmin Mobile for Blackberry introduces a lifetime of navigation".

Only available in North America for customers who prefer a one-off payment rather than continuous monthly payments, the one-time purchase is $99.99, as opposed to $9.99 per month.

What's the catch?

The one-time purchase plan is not transferable between BlackBerry devices.

Slowly but surely, the sensor and chip manufacturing industry seem to be a) talking to each other / buying each other, or b) talking about the need to make location work on mobile devices.

It’s about time.