Navteq attracts 115 LBS apps developers

Rating: Some entries look genuinely useful
by Tony Dennis

If Nokia recently
paid $8 billion dollars for a company, you’d have to take some notice – wouldn’t
you? So I caved into perusing details of Navteq’s Global LBS Challenge competition. Some of the apps look genuinely useful, though.
This particular competition is for bods based in the EMEA region so
it’s fairly impressive that no fewer than 115 bothered to enter.
Although the top prize winner will receive €35,000 ($51,000) in cash
and one three-year Navteq territory license valued at €225,000
($330,000). So that’s a bit of an incentive.

The company tries to pretend that the apps might run on any portable device but
we all know they want apps that’ll work on Nokias.
So far, Navteq has whittled the entries down to twelve finalists. A boost for
us Brits is that three of them are UK based.
Some of the apps
up for top prize are seriously tedious. All to do with tracking vehicles and
the like. Yawn. But what’s this? Haggle is a mobile
phone app [told you so] that can find the best ‘deal’ on a hotel room based on
individual preferences. I wonder if it would work in Barcelona when we all descend on it for MWC?
Anyway Haggle has been produced by Mimosa Wireless and, golly josh, it’s a UK based company. I’m transparent, aren’t I?
The gongs are being given out during the Mobile World Congress. It would be
pretty embarrassing if you were a finalist and unable to find the awards dinner
venue, wouldn’t it?

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