Dentsu releases app for location-based food search for iOS devices

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Advertising giant Dentsu has released a social app for location-based food search for iOS devices.

Recently, there has been a surge in restaurant and food related searches on smartphones and PC. Most are still centered around searching for restaurants in particular, but the newly released FoodKing enables searching for the particular food item of interest in your area, based on your location.

The FoodKing app enables users to uncover food items such as omelets and pasta that might be provided by a Japanese restaurant, with search results based on users’ food requests combined with their locations.

Users can also “like” and “comment” on reviews and gather points to become a King of an individual food ranking, providing fun and incentives to enhance the user experience.

This app was released globally so that users can communicate through food reviews throughout the world. Dentsu will be adding new food categories every month so that users can access their more types of food, and also local foods in their countries, based on where the app is downloaded. Additional language support is forthcoming as well; the app currently supports English and Japanese in the interface, and reviews in all languages.

Dentsu plans to develop a food database that can be used worldwide, and build a platform where other companies can provide coupons, incentives and featured dishes.

FoodKing Overview:

— Freen– Available on iOS devices (iOS 5.1.1 and over)n– Download URL: http://itunes.apple.com/jp/app/foodking/id551521544?l=en&mt=8

FoodKing Functions:

— Timeline for food reviewsn– Select between showing all reviews or just reviews from users that are being followedn– Show food reviews on a map based on the individual food items chosenn– “Like” or add comments to food reviews and accumulate pointsn– Become King (or Queen) of a food item by accumulating pointsn– Localization of food category page based on the country the app is downloadedn– Send direct messages to other usersn– Automatically post reviews to Facebook and Twitter