Getting to know a city while on the move has never been this easy, it appears. All you need to do is key in the name of the locality in your mobile phone and hey presto! you not only have a map of the area but also details of where the restaurants, ATMs and gas stations are.

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And it’s not long before the Indian consumers can lay their hands, or rather fingers, on this technology.

Wayfinder Systems AB, a supplier of location and navigation services for mobile phones, is set to offer its location-based services in India from July or August.

Magnus Nilsson, Chief Executive, Wayfinder, says the company has been offering its services to Airtel’s customers who have a Blackberry handset, for the past five months. The company now plans to extend this service to all consumers. Wayfinder will offer its services through Airtel, or through the Internet. Consumers can buy their services from a Web site called MapmyIndia.

The application will be preloaded on certain Nokia and Sony Ericsson handsets as well. Nilsson says by the end of this year there will be about two million customers in India willing to pay for navigation service. Wayfinder expects 20 per cent of its total business from India in the next couple of years.

The service in Europe costs about 5 euros a month, including data. In India, it will be much lower, he adds.