French telecoms equipment maker Alcatel Lucent is jumping into the mobile advertising space with a location-based service aimed at carriers, the company said today. The hosted service allows brands to send location-aware text alerts to consumers who have opted in to receive them. For example, consumers could receive special offers or coupons from a store they’d signed up to receive alerts each time they were near to one. Alcatel Lucent has partnered with San Francisco-based 1020 Placecast, the location-based advertising services provider, which will work with brands to create their campaigns.

Aside from Alcatel’s new offering, a number of other location-aware mobile ad services have been announced or debuted in the last two weeks. Vodafone (NYSE: VOD) has decided to use Wayfinder, the Swedish navigation service it bought in December, to provide location-aware ads, while Nokia’s mapping division Navteq recently rolled out its location-based advertising service, LocationPoint, in Europe. Vodacom, the South African carrier that Vodafone owns a 50 percent stake in, meanwhile, introduced location-based ads into its mobile social network platform The Grid.

After years of promise, (coupons flashed at you as you walk by Starbucks!) is location-based advertising finally getting some traction? Not quite, according to the WSJ.com, which says “the technology for location-based ads is running ahead of demand.” Ad executives apparently want to see more research on the hard numbers of how location-aware ads are translating into sales. Alexandre Mars, the mobile head of ad giant Publicis Groupe and the chief executive of its Phonevalley mobile-marketing agency, told the paper, “The question is always the same: Can we drive more sales?”