NaviGadget

Skyhook Wireless’ Wi-Fi Position System (WPS) available for developers

Jun 13, 2006 gps navigation, misc news, software

The three-year-old wireless company will offer developers free access to its metro-area positioning system, which relies on Wi-Fi signals rather than GPS signals to compute a user’s location.

The Global Positioning System is getting some competition and mobile phone developer networks may feel the heat, too.

Skyhook Wireless tomorrow plans to introduce the Skyhook Developer’s Network at O’Reilly Media Where 2.0 conference in San Jose, Calif.

The three-year-old wireless company, backed by Bain Capital, Intel Capital, and Nokia Innovent, aims to woo developers of location-based services with free access to its metro-area position system, which relies on Wi-Fi signals rather than GPS signals to compute a user’s location.

Skyhook Wireless’ Wi-Fi Position System (WPS) takes advantage of the ubiquity of Wi-Fi access points in urban areas and is able to compute the location of a Wi-Fi-enabled mobile device in less than a second. According to the company, “WPS has no line of sight requirements, is accurate to within twenty meters and can be used indoors or outdoors to determine location in seconds.”

WPS is currently active in the top 100 U.S. metropolitan areas and Skyhook expects its coverage to reach 70% of the U.S. population by the end the year.

Ted Morgan, CEO of Skyhook Wireless, says that developing location-based applications for mobile network operators can be costly. First, he says, Skyhook doesn’t require specialized GPS hardware, which costs money. “When you’ve got a device maker that’s putting out a new phone or new PDA, they have to justify every penny that goes into that device,” he says. “Having to put a $5 to $10 GPS chip in there is fairly expensive.”

Adding Wi-Fi to mobile devices costs money too, but Morgan suggests equipment makers are more likely to include Wi-Fi because it’s a technology that has uses beyond pinpointing one’s location. Moreover, it’s a cost consumers may willingly bear because of the utility of Wi-Fi connectivity. Skyhook’s network would most likely be useful to users of laptops, PDAs, Smartphones, and tablet PCs, which tend to have Wi-Fi connectivity.

via