Nokia?s Ovi Maps has over 1,000 city guides by Lonely Planet
WHAT IF, WITH JUST a few clicks of your cell phone, the possibility of getting lost in a foreign place is eliminated, with maps and even street directions now available on your mobile?

Last February, Nokia launched the Nokia N900 at the Showcase Nokia 2010 held in Bangkok, Thailand. At the event, the company announced it was now transitioning from a purely mobile device company to one offering solutions with its music services, applications and messaging, all by Nokia?s Ovi Suite.

?What we?re focusing on is delivering experiences. The combination of device and service delivers the experience to the consumer at the end of the day,? said Chris Carr, vice president for South East Asia Pacific Sales.

Location service

Nokia?s location service solution features a drive and walk navigation that allows users to find their way in almost any major city without having to open a computer or fish out a city map from the car?s glove compartment.

Ovi Maps is available in 74 countries in 46 languages, including the Philippines, and is free of charge for compatible Nokia devices. Stored maps can be downloaded from the Ovi Maps website (http://maps.ovi.com) and then transferred to devices. The world map consumes 6 gigabytes; the Greater Manila area ranges from 10 to 12 MB.

Jukka Hosio, director of Services Marketing for Location, said Ovi Maps was designed to answer consumers? desire for a ?great out-of-the-box experience without hidden costs.?

He added that Ovi Maps is 10 times more efficient than Google maps in terms of data transfer and lower data costs, and is the most cost- and energy-efficient location service in the market today.

Its GPS navigation system, which offers voice-command navigation, real-time traffic and event updates, is as good as built-in car navigation systems. The online service for real-time updates is currently being set up for user rates with local telecommunications companies.

The maps are verified by NAVTEQ, Nokia?s digital map data and content company, based on actual driving and walking tests through the streets. They are updated several times a year.

The option to share one?s location through social networking site Facebook is available. A few clicks on your mobile device, and a real-time update (with photo, if you like) of the best burger in town, a must-go-to sale or a celebrity sighting can be published on your Facebook account through GPS.

As of Feb. 15, over three million Ovi Maps have been downloaded globally. This translates to more than one download per second, adding up to more than 100,000 downloads per day.

Ovi Maps is the current choice for navigation around the world. Over 1,000 city guides by Lonely Planet are also available through Ovi.

?Free navigation is just the starting point. The end game is that we have a third party, any content provider or application provider who use that data and develop applications that use navigation or mapping, or showing places on their application. That?s the future. But today, it?s about free navigation,? said Hosio.

Other offerings

The other Ovi Suite offerings, such as Ovi Music, Store and Mail, were also highlighted at Showcase Nokia 2010.

Ovi Music allows users to download music from the website and discover unsigned acts from the Nokia Independent Artists? Club. Ovi Store will be available in more languages, offer better billing support and carry more applications this 2010. Currently, it logs more than 1,000,000 downloads a day.

Ovi Mail, meanwhile, which allows users to receive and send e-mail through mobile devices with the push e-mail service, has had over 6,000,000 accounts created in just a year after its launch. Thirty percent of Ovi Mail users come from Southeast Asia.

Open-ended design

The Nokia N900, which will come out in the market this month, is an ?open-ended? phone in that ?it allows users to put whatever application they want,? said Nikki Barton, Nokia?s head of Digital Design.

For example, the phone has a home screen that can be personalized with applications, and multiple home screens to allow for multitasking.

However, simplicity and ease of use remain key factors in the design, so that a user who prefers a simpler set-up need not even bother himself with such function, said Barton. The mobile device?s interface designs adapt to users? preferences with ease.

Barton revealed that psychologists work with Nokia designers to help achieve their phone?s user-friendliness, by considering which natural inclinations and habits of people can be translated into interface design. Since users find touchscreens easy to use, the Nokia N900 has this feature?but still with a pullout qwerty keyboard for those who?d prefer the classic mode.