Creativity Software & Claro unveil a Family & Friend Finder service in Central America

Nov. 20, 2008 - PRLog -- Creativity Software, a supplier of white label location solutions, and Claro, a member of the America Movil group and the leading wireless service provider in Latin America, today announced the successful deployment of ‘Servicio de Localizacion de Claro’ a mass market Location Based Service for the emerging Guatemalan mobile market.

Claro demanded a brand new approach with an implementation from Creativity Software based on Cell-ID and SMS rather than GPS to find individuals.  Subscribers – both pre and post-paid - are now able to locate relatives and friends through a straightforward text message interface. To be able to locate others, a user simply needs to send a message with the keyword ‘Locate’ to a short code (7575).  The system will then reply with a short message giving the approximate address of where the person being located is to be found. These messages are charged at US$0.65.

Because Claro did not have the infrastructure required to enable mobile location services based on cell-id (GMLC / SMLC), Creativity Software provided Claro with a cost-effective alternative. For this they worked with their partner – and Claro’s preferred supplier - OSI, a leading telecoms service provider in Central America.  The outcome was the installation of a SS7 Signalling Gateway that interrogates Claro’s network to retrieve the positioning data of the mobile phone being located.

In order to register for the service, Claro’s users in Guatemala simply need to send a text message to a short code (7474) to request an account activation, to add, modify or delete ‘locatees’ and to request an SMS with the names and numbers of people they can locate or who can locate them. These messages are charged at US$1.0.

To give peace of mind to users, an opt-in mechanism has been put in place demanding users’ authorisation to allow others to locate them. The system also allows users to send a message at any point in time to stop others being able to locate them.  The service offers a series of other SMS commands that make the service easy to use.

“Delivering Claro Localizer has been a real challenge, to take our FamilyWise solution and create a completely new approach to delivering a next generation service without the availability of next generation network infrastructure or handsets,” said Richard Lee, CEO, Creativity Software. “What we have come to recognise as groundbreaking about Claro’s Mobile Location Service is that there really are no constraints for mass market adoption of location based services. It has opened our eyes to the broad possibilities of delivering new services that need not be reliant on GPS or even use of maps as part of the user interface. It also demonstrates how SMS still has an incredibly powerful role to play in delivering new services in both developed and emerging markets. That is hugely encouraging for operators and users alike.”

For Claro, Ernesto Rossbach – President of OSI – said “The take up rate in the trial period has been more than 5 times what we have experienced with previous service offerings. The launch of “Servicio de Localizacion de Claro” demonstrates once again our intention to extend to our clients the best mobile experience and the widest range of communication possibilities through the application of innovative technologies that deliver in the real world”

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Established in 2001, Creativity Software is a privately-held company specialising in Location Based Services (LBS). With offices in the UK and China, and distributors in Latin America, the Middle East and India, we are a trusted partner of mobile network operators (wireless carriers), mobile device manufacturers, service providers and large enterprises from around the world, and supply a variety of white label (non-branded) location based solutions.