To be sure, location-based services are quickly becoming one of the must-have features in mobile applications, and is used to find friends, look up nearby businesses, find driving directions and even to deliver a well-targeted ad. However, GPS and other forms of location technologies can be costly and time-intensive to provide. In most circumstances, developers must negotiate directly with each carrier, and then also pay substantial fees. Carriers can also find it costly on their end. Undoubtedly, there will likely be a number of players that will try to unlock the bottleneck, but the carriers will probably only play ball with a few chosen.

Besides Loc-Aid, another company making moves today is Skyhook Wireless. In an announcement, it said it formed a partnership with Qualcomm (NSDQ: QCOM), which develops GPS technology. Skyhook has a radically different approach than Loc-Aid, and acts independently of the carrier’s network, by locating phones by finding nearby Wi-Fi hotspots. Its claim to fame is providing location information to the iPhone. Through the partnership, Qualcomm will be able to distribute Skyhook’s Wi-Fi services and plans to incorporate the company’s technology into its GPS technology. Together, the two companies will be able to provide hybrid Wi-Fi/GPS solutions. Release.