The nation’s largest telecommunications firm said it would launch a mobile service that will allow visitors to the upcoming Taipei International Flora Expo to use their smartphones as personal tour guides.
Chunghwa Telecom Co (CHT), which has more than 9.5 million subscribers to its mobile phone service in Taiwan, will offer a tour guide application, or app, for smartphones, that would allow subscribers to browse pictures and written information on more than 3,300 flower species at the expo.
The company will also offer guide services in which subscribers can dial recorded messages providing information on the expo or scan an identifying bar code that will be set up at various scenic spots to hear or read the information on their phones.
“We hope visitors from abroad will gain more enjoyment from the expo with these applications,” said Shih Mu-piao (石木標), head of CHT’s Mobile Business Group.
The information will be available in Chinese, English and Japanese.
The app will be available from Oct. 25 from CHT’s online software shop and Apple’s App Store and will work on phones such as HTC, Samsung, Sony Ericsson and Apple.
The smartphones will also be linked through Bluetooth technology to a specially designed device called a “dongle,” which will be carried by the user and display related information on the subscriber’s phone when it detects that he or she is in a particular spot.
The company said it would provide 240 smartphones for rental to visitors who do not subscribe to its mobile phone service when the expo officially opens on Nov. 6.
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