New directions for location-based services

A recent forecast issued by market analysis firm ABI Research suggests the potential for mobile location-based services is huge, anticipating annual global revenues of $13.3 billion by 2013, up from $515 million in 2007. ABI credits the surge to new WCDMA and GSM handsets incorporating GPS capabilities as well as consumer demand for personal navigation functionality, not to mention mobile applications such as friend finders, local information searches, family tracker apps and enterprise apps. Here are five mobile LBS advances worth following in the months ahead.