Name: Ripple Mobile
Quick Pitch: Ripple Mobile’s first app, OnTime, alerts you when you need to leave for your next event based on your current location.
Genius Idea: Business travelers have a habit of squeezing appointments into their schedules like they’re putting together a jigsaw puzzle. But in unfamiliar territory, it can be hard to gauge how much time is needed to travel from one meeting to another in a different location.
Enter OnTime, Ripple’s first app for iPhone (Android and BlackBerry apps are on the way). The app pulls in whatever calendars are loaded onto your phone, and uses the Google Maps API to help the user assign each appointment an address. It then sends push notifications when it’s time to leave for an appointment based on how much travel time is between your current location and destination.
Other apps send push notifications based on times that you enter, but OnTime is the only app I’ve found that will calculate based on my location AND give me turn-by-turn directions with travel conditions. There’s also an option to set alerts for a bit of cushion time before leaving for meetings, pick and choose which calendars to receive notifications for, and send an e-mail or text message if you are running late. When you arrive at your location, the app will ask you if you’d like to share it to Facebook or Twitter.
Except for a public transportation setting (president and co-founder Kevin Miller assures me this feature is on the way) and an option to check into Foursquare within the app (a future possibility), I can’t think of anything e lse I would want my...
