Telecom research firm Berg Insight says the global market for location-based services (LBS) platforms and middleware is expected to grow steadily in the next few years. Annual revenue for this equipment, including A-GPS servers and middleware platforms, is projected to grow from about €150 million last year to €300 million (£263 million) in 2016.
Some of this demand is driven by regulation that requires the accurate location of any handset calling the emergency services - even if the device isn’t equipped with GPS - with network-based location technologies also offering superior indoor coverage and reliability.
André Malm, Senior Analyst at Berg Insight, said “Location-based services have gained mainstream acceptance, enabled by broader adoption of GPS-enabled smartphones. All leading handset vendors provide their own assistance services for GPS handsets to ensure a good user experience in case the operator has not yet deployed A-GPS services.”
[LBS Platforms and Technologies report brochure (pdf)]