Think of it as a "car finder," or a "hotel finder," rather than a "key finder" - although the small device, known as the "ECCO," attaches to a set of car keys in much the same way. The company is marketing the gadget as an aid for travelers, to electronically mark the location of a hotel or car in a large parking lot, a fishing hole, or other location. The ECCO was launched at the CES show last week, where it was a finalist for one of the the show's Innovation Awards.

IDC will begin accepting orders for the ECCO on Jan. 28, the company said. The ECCO will be offered for a list price of $99.99, although IDC will charge $89.99 for customers buying it from the company's online store.

Unlike conventional GPS devices, the ECCO does not include any built-in mapping software. Instead, the bare-bones unit simply points in a given direction, and estimates the number of feet to the destination.

Here's the way it works: a user exits his hotel or car, and pushes one of three "location" buttons, then locks the unit's location with a second key press. When the user pushes the location button a second time, the ECCO guides him or her back to the locked location, up to 9,999 miles away, according to IDC. The GPS satellite acquisition time is, at most, 30 seconds, the company claims.

The weakness? Like most travel-oriented GPS devices, the ECCO can't detect height, so the ECCO will be only be able to do so much to help find a car parked in a multi-story parking garage.

Users recharge the ECCO's built-in battery through a USB cable; the company has not posted any estimates of the unit's battery life.