GPS navigators can pretty much find anything these days--except for your friends. Today, TeleNav, the GPS-navigation application provider, launched its latest version of TeleNav GPS Navigator for regular mobile phones. Starting immediately, subscribers can send their current locations to any other mobile phone that can receive text messages. Not only can you send text messages with your location, but you can also share a map of the area. TeleNav users who are using the latest version of the software can also receive a friend's location via text and can navigate to it using the service's turn-by-turn directions.

 

We tested out the new version of TeleNav on a Sprint Motorola Razr V3m. After loading the program we clicked on the Maps button on the main menu and told the program to find our current location. After our location was plotted on a map, we hit the Option button and the Share Location button. This part was extremely simple, as our phone prompted us with our address book; we just selected the contacts we wanted to send our location to. We sent it to our friend across the city as well as to our colleague's phone in our office. Both received our listed address within seconds. Neither of the text messages came with a link to a map, however.

 

Customers can also share addresses of favorite restaurants or stores with others and rate these locations directly from their phones. The new version adds a Fuel Finder that allows users to send information on local gas station and prices. Your account can also be accessed through a Web-based application called MyTeleNav on the TeleNav Web site.

 

The new version of TeleNav GPS Navigator (version 5.2) is initially available on select Sprint phones.  The service is offered to customers for $9.99 per month for unlimited use.  Current customers using TeleNav GPS Navigator on supported phones can access the new version by re-downloading TeleNav GPS Navigator.