ISRO, MapmyIndia To Develop New Mapping Service; Can It Beat Google Maps?

ISRO is busy with several projects, including the latest one to take on Google Maps. ISRO has joined hands with MapmyIndia, a navigation solutions provider, to create an indigenous mapping solution. The joint project would bring in a mapping portal that could rival Google Maps, joining the list of Aatmanirbhar Bharat projects.

MapmyIndia CEO and Executive Director, Rohan Verma said the new mapping and geospatial service would make India self-sufficient without having to rely on a service designed outside India. His LinkedIn post further stressed that users won't need Google Maps or Google Earth any longer.

"Through the combined partnership with ISRO, MapmyIndia's end-user maps, apps, and services will now integrate with ISRO's huge catalog of satellite imagery and earth observation data and would be a much better, more detailed and comprehensive, as well as privacy-centric, hyper-local and indigenous mapping solution for Indians, compared to foreign map apps and solutions," Verma said in the post.

ISRO, MapmyIndia Sign Deal

According to a PTI report, ISRO and CE Info Systems Pvt Ltd, owned by MapmyIndia, signed an MoU. The new deal would develop solutions by leveraging their geoportals and work on enhancing geospatial expertise.

"The collaboration will enable them to jointly identify and build holistic geospatial solutions utilizing the earth observation datasets, "NavIC", Web Services and APIs (application programming interface) available in MapmyIndia, "Bhuvan", "VEDAS" and "MOSDAC" geoportals," ISRO said in a statement.

For those unaware, the Indian Space Research Organization already develops NavIC or the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System or IRNSS. The Indian-made system navigates with the Indian Constellation, which enables geomapping.

Going further into the details, once the service begins rolling out, users can see MapmyIndia's maps and services from a bird's point of view. Users can also benefit from several map-based analytics and insights about the weather, pollution, agricultural output, land-use changes, flood and landslide disasters, and so on, Verma explained.

As noted, the aim is also to reduce dependence on Google Maps, which is currently one of the most popular mapping services across the globe. If MapmyIndia's service can really kick in, it would be one of the key success projects of the Aatmanirbhar Bharat mission.