Augmentra: Visualizing the Great Outdoors - GPS applications for smartphones

location based services

While most GPS applications for smartphones can get you round town ViewRanger from Augmentra is designed for the great outdoors. This S60 application is more than a simple mapping system. Richard Bloor talks to Augmentra co-founder, Mike Brocklehurst.

Augmentra was formed by Craig Wareham and Mike Brocklehurst in 2004. Craig and Mike had worked together before forming Augmentra, mainly in graphics systems. They jointly recognized the potential of a mapping system specifically designed for use in the countryside. While there were several desktop and PDA application in this marketplace there was nothing for smartphones, particularly mass market devices such as those based on S60. The initial version of Augmentra's ViewRanger was launched in 2005, with ViewRanger 2 following in March of 2006.
Richard Bloor spoke to Mike Brocklehurst about ViewRanger and the development of the latest version for S60 3rd Edition devices.
Richard: How did the idea for ViewRanger come about?
Mike: It was a combination of personal interest and a perception of market interest. We could see there was a demand for PC applications dealing with outdoor mapping and dedicated GPS systems were becoming a popular, but limited, choice for outdoor enthusiasts. There were some applications for PDA, but these devices are heavy and have poor battery life compared to smartphones. We wanted to offer more than just a 'map on a phone'. So we perceived that a smartphone application that capitalized on the media and connectivity features of a smartphone, offering good battery life and quality mapping in a lightweight device, would have a market.