Social networking applications that take advantage of location information could become a key driver for growing the location-based services market, according to a new report from ABI Research.

The firm predicts the market for fully mobile location-based social networking sites will support more than 82 million subscriptions by 2013. LBS applications also are expected to incorporate fixed social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace.

ABI said mobile social networking applications unify a large set of location-based services like friend finders, local search and geo-tagging. “While growth will be mainly driven by the availability of multimedia-centric GPS handsets, other mobile form factors will also become important,” said Dominique Bonte, director at ABI Research. “Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs) with built-in GPS receivers have been announced, with location-based social networking site GyPSii supporting Moblin-based Intel Atom processor-powered MIDs.

“Connected PNDs and outdoor GPS solutions are other obvious candidates for location-based networking,” said Bonte. “Nissan Carwings’ in-car telematics solution allows the sharing and ranking of fuel consumption in Japan.”

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One Response

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1. Claudio Schapsis
   December 25, 2008 06:17 am

   I agree that Location Based Social Networking (LBSN) applications will become a key driver for growing the location-based services market. The fact is that the accessibility of technology creates communities and services , and the commoditization of GPS enabled phones will accelerate the process.But we need to remember that the key of the social networks is interaction, and mobile interaction = money . So my first question is who is going to pay the bill? I addressed this issue in a series of post regarding Location Based Social Networking business models in my BLOG www.BDNooz.comIn my BLOG I put together a list of more than 50 LBSN companies. My first impression is that many of the LBSN today are "me too" applications, and at this point I can’t pinpoint one that present a marketing message with a unique offer, a distinctive value proposition or main differentiators from the others. What drives us to the ultimate question: "What is the real value for the end user?" I doubt anybody can base a business model on the hope the Facebook / MySpace "exhibitionistic" generation is ready to buy "stalk/being stalked" as a main added value.

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