Nokia Ovi Maps sees 1.4 million downloads
Nokia today announced that since the 21 January 2010 launch of the updated version of Ovi Maps there have been over 1.4 million downloads. The one million mark was reached just one week after the launch.
“We’re averaging a download a second, 24 hours a day,” said Anssi Vanjoki, Executive Vice President, Nokia. “When we announced free walk & drive navigation we knew it would be a game-changer. The number of people now using their Nokia for navigation, and as a result looking for more location-aware software, is growing faster than even we predicted.”
In late January Nokia announced plans to make walk and drive navigation free on its smartphones as part of a new version of Ovi Maps.
This updated version includes a number of new features such as turn-by-turn voice guidance for 74 countries in 46 languages, and traffic information for over 10 countries, as well as detailed maps for over 180 countries.
According to Vanjoki the quick success of the update “is great news for our 3rd party application developers. Within a matter of days there is an installed base of more than 1 million active users all potentially hungry for new and innovative location-aware apps. For the operators too there is a growing opportunity to sell more data-plans and a complete navigation package to existing and new customers.”
“There is a huge appetite for GPS navigation on mobile phones. We estimate there were already 25.9 million people actively using GPS navigation on their mobile phones at the end of 2009,” said Chris Jones, VP & Principal Analyst at research firm Canalys.
From next month, all new Nokia GPS-enabled smartphones will include the new version of Ovi Maps, pre-loaded with local country map data.
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