INDIA: Google Maps will now include the brand-new Street View function. However, just ten Indian cities would initially receive it.
After failing to introduce the famous “Street View” experience to India at least twice in the past ten years due to security concerns voiced by government agencies over the collecting of data, Google on Wednesday announced the availability of the function in India.
This time, Google has teamed with two Indian companies: Tech Mahindra and Genesys International, a provider of mapping technologies.
According to the National Geospatial Policy, 2021, local businesses can gather these data, and international companies can obtain licences from Indian authorities to use the data to provide services to domestic clients.
Street View, which lets users view panoramic and street-level 360-degree views of a specific place, is being entirely brought to life by local partners for the first time in the globe with the India launch.
Street Views will now be accessible on Google Maps with new imagery obtained from local partners that span eleven Indian cities, including Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Pune, Nashik, Vadodara, Ahmednagar, and Amritsar, and that covers more than 1,50,000 km.
By the end of 2022, Google, Genesys International, and Tech Mahindra hope to have this available in more than 50 locations and have travelled just under one million unique kilometres.
“The new geospatial policy permits regional organisations to collect data with a particular level of accuracy. As a result, our associates here set up the cameras and went to collect the data.”
According to Miriam Karthika Daniel, VP of Google Maps Experiences, “They own the data that they contain, but they licence it to businesses like Google, so we can actually integrate it and create services like Google Maps.”
Additionally, it stated that local developers would have access to Street View APIs, allowing them to offer richer mapping experiences in their services.
The business also disclosed collaborations with regional traffic authorities to enhance traffic flow and lessen congestion. Starting with Bengaluru, Google Maps will now display speed restriction information the traffic authority provides.
To provide information on congestion zones, road closures, etc., the company has also worked with traffic authorities and aggregators in eight Indian cities, including Delhi, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad, and Kolkata, Gurgaon, Bangalore, and Agra.
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