Technology: Lost In Space

Location-based services are today's hottest tech. Here's looking at a revolution that'll make sure you're never far away from the info-mainstream.

We've no particular fondness for those who sell fizzy drinks-disinterest would best describe our attitude to the two warring tribes which make a living out of this. Still, one of them does seem to have captured the zeitgeist of a revolution-waiting-to-happen in a hoary corporate mission-statement about making its product available within arm's reach of desire. For, if information is the most transactable of commodities c. 2000, the ability to provide info on the fly (generically termed location-based services) is surely something of a killer-app.

Total Recall

A slice of mundane life on Bangalore's potholed roads. A two-wheeler rider complains to the traffic police that a city transport bus was involved in a minor accident with his vehicle and claims insurance damages. The insurance firm tries its best to verify the authenticity of the claim before it brasses up. However, if the mandarins manning the Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) have their way, they can prove that the bus wasn't in the vicinity when the alleged accident took place, courtesy a GPS-enabled tracking mechanism. This, claims the BMTC, will help it manage a fleet of 2,400 buses that do 35,000 trips a day.

A GPS+GIS (a digitised map of Bangalore, developed with the assistance of the Indian Space Research Organisation forms the basis of this) monitors the movement of the buses at a master control room.

The data thus generated can be utilised to ensure adherence to schedules, compute the exact distance travelled in a given time period, the speed of the bus, and the time taken to cover a distance. Says Pradeep Singh Kharola, Managing Director, BMTC: ''We have introduced the tracking system in 100 buses to begin with, and the results are encouraging. Each trip generates a revenue of Rs 400 and if we are able to increase our efficiency, we can earn crores of rupees in additional revenue every year.'' BMTC plans to equip its entire fleet of 2,400 buses with GPS receivers, in the next one year. The cost? A mere Rs 10,000 a bus.

The successful implementation of this service is critical, as the corporation hires buses from private owners and the computation of the distance travelled-the basis for payments-now becomes totally objective. Already other states like Delhi, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, and Andhra Pradesh are talking to BMTC to implement a similar system in their states.
-Venkatesha Babu

The utility of this app becomes evident when you consider situations where you may need it. You're driving from Delhi to Agra and your car develops a problem. Wouldn't it be great to just press a button on your dashboard that activates a GPS (Global Positioning System) receiver, and wait for help? The receiver bounces off a signal-with information on your car's location and, if it has a microprocessor-based diagnostic, the exact nature of the problem-from a satellite. The signal reaches your car company or a break-down service provider, which immediately notifies the service station closest to your location.

Or, shunning alarmist tendencies to quote examples about cars that break down, and hearts that suddenly have attacks, let's speak about an urge for a pizza while driving from Gurgaon to your office at Connaught Place. You dial 'pizza' on your mobile. The service provider knows your exact location from the 'cell' where the query originated. It uses a GIS (Geographical Information System) to identify the pizza outlet closest to you and send you the response as a SMS (Smart Messaging Service) message or a voice-mail.

A GIS is a detailed map that weaves in other variables. The use of a GIS itself, thus, isn't unique. Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd, wove in variables like tele-density, population-density, and roads and buildings into a master GIS that will form the basis of its network expansion initiatives in Delhi. The real SA of the arm's-reach-of-desire kind of stuff we are discussing is the combination of technologies it uses. By juxtaposing a GIS database with a consumer-access technology it makes the delivery of relevant information possible.

To pre-empt the two questions you're itching to ask, yes, these services are for real, and no, you'll have to wait sometime before you can use them. Reason for the delay: using satellites isn't really practical in construction-heavy urban areas where demand for these location-based services is likely to be concentrated. The cellular option is better but the cell service providers will also have to upgrade to GPRS (General Packet Radio Services), best described as the the wireless equivalent of a 2-mbps leased line to your mobile. Agrees Vijay Shekar Sharma, coo, one97.com: ''We are waiting for GPRS to proliferate before launching advanced location-based services.'' Right now, the company, named after the number one dials for directory information, provides just that to Airtel's subscribers in Delhi in SMS format. Still, it won't take too long for GPRS to become the industry standard: BPL has already moved in, and the company operates cellular services in Mumbai, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, and Kerala.

Others, like Airtel and Essar, provide tracking services that piggyback on the cellular network. A logistics service provider can use this to keep track of its trucks. I.B. Saxena Lab's sanjaygps.com offers this service within Delhi and plans to upgrade to a cellular-network based navigation service soon.

If it's p2p that you're looking for, three kinds of companies can look to profit from this breakthrough. Mapping companies that create GIS databases are the first. Avers Manchitra Services' Rohit Goel: ''Without a high-quality digital map no location-based application services can succeed.'' Still, companies operating in this domain like Sify's roadsofindia.com and mapsofindia.com, haven't really moved beyond rudimentary services. Regulatory haze-about the printing of maps and their reproduction in CDs or other media-could be one reason for this.

The companies that import and sell the handsets for high-end location-tracking services are the second. These come for anything between Rs 6,000 and Rs 40,000. However, most customers are likely to use their existing cell phones (or next-GEN WAP ones) to access these services. The third set are tech-providers like Hope Technologies, one97.com, and sanjaygps.com, which can enter into revenue-sharing deals with cell service providers. Revenues will get a fillip when it becomes possible to locate a subscriber (or user) with a low margin of error. Third Generation (3G) cellular technology will make this possible, but that is at least two to three years away in India.

The benefits of accessing information on the fly could, however, boost the acceptance of this technology. As a recent Lycos report on Australia-where a company is creating a GIS database of public toilets-puts it: ''there may be 13,000 public toilets in Australia, but there's only one that matters-the closest one''.