[SmartCat]

MapmyIndia has quietly launched a free GPS navigation app for Android and iPhone, with route planning and real time traffic updates.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiKA00REhUk

ET Article:
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com...w/63060134.cms

I did some testing today. My initial impressions:




- You need to fill up a big form with username and password. And the password needs to have upper case, lower case, special character and all that jazz. Login via facebook does not seem to be working

- My son's school is missing. My in-law's apartment name too. But anybody can add places and submit. So over time, it should be as useful as Google Maps.

- You can search by typing in postal address. Sharing your address is easy too via a 5 or 6 digit code.

- Live traffic updates does not seem to be working. I mean, the route doesn't turn orange and red as you drive along.

- Does not switch to landscape mode. You need to position the phone vertically.

- Seems very aggressive in finding a route with the shortest possible time to reach a destination. Even if it takes you through narrow roads. In my testing, it avoided a traffic signal with an average wait time of 2 minutes by taking me along narrow roads.

- Seems to indicate that you save 20 minutes on a 25 km trip, as compared to Google Maps.

MapmyIndia App:



Google Maps:



When I zoom in to see the route, Mapymyindia route is slightly different - looks like it is avoiding traffic signals and jams. Haven't actually tested this on long city trips though.

[arvind71181]

I don't think there is any significant advantage over using the ubiquitous google maps. In fact, they have marked my route from office to home incorrectly, via a road which is blocked. This is because, as you said, they look for the shortest route. This approach has led me into many problems when using Gmaps . They will probably get better at it though

[mpksuhas]

In my opinion, too late for them to make this move.

They were leaders in India till few years back, still have majority market share in corporate customer space (Check out the link below). Still, they missed getting individual users in their umbrella.

I remember they used to advertise many (~8 years?) back that they have street level maps and house / plot level search and navigate option for major cities. That was a time when Google maps was just taking baby steps in India, real time traffic date was unheard of & individual level map updates only fraction of what is there now.

If only they would have taken this step to make maps free for public then, the amount of data from user updates and trends would have been tremendous input for MMI. This step though in right direction, I feel is bit late. I only hope I am proved wrong.


My car (XUV) has inbuilt maps from MMI, I used to use navigation regularly during initial days of my car purchase some 3.5 years back. Even as recently as in 2014, Google maps were not reliable as now (comparatively ). However, with data becoming cheaper and accessible from majority of remote highways & offline maps from Google where network can be flaky, I rarely use vehicle infotainment maps anymore.

With Android Auto slowly becoming standard in most of infotainment systems, it becomes even convenient for you to share any map point of interest you checked before your trip on your mobile / computer to your vehicle screen.

There was an article about the same in Economic Times few days back. Link


NB: Other side of coin for user edited maps, reliablity of content is a question mark. Though it should even out with more users, you still find few odd updates. In the opening post by Smartcat, do checkout the naming of Bangalore Outer ring road - NE2 (National Express Way 2, which is under construction in Delhi) Link

[libranof1987]

Originally Posted by mpksuhas

In my opinion, too late for them to make this move.

+1

With big dog, Google Maps, around, what value-add does this app bring out for users.

Call me a skeptic, but I feel MMI may be using this app for self-serving purposes: a) building a database of Points of Interest as and when users add them. Using crowd-funding/sourcing to build your service!, b) data collection from your phone on variety of things, especially considering below:

Originally Posted by smartcat

- You need to fill up a big form with username and password. And the password needs to have upper case, lower case, special character and all that jazz. Login via facebook does not seem to be working

[mpksuhas]

Originally Posted by libranof1987

Using crowd-funding/sourcing to build your service!, b) data collection from your phone on variety of things, especially considering below:

Yes, of course. That is what Google perfected. However, MMI has limited leverage here since -

- Already Google maps has established as the default go to application here.
- Google Maps comes pre-loaded in all Android devices.
- Google account has established an environment, where your saved locations are migrated across logins seamlessly. Google already has data of your hotel bookings and search pattern, which can be used to optimize your search and map display.

[ankan.m.blr]

Is this new version of MMI compatible with Android Auto ?

[GTO]

Maps are all about resources. If Apple couldn't beat Google Maps, I doubt MapMyIndia will ever be able to.

Originally Posted by mpksuhas

They were leaders in India till few years back, still have majority market share in corporate customer space (Check out the link below). Still, they missed getting individual users in their umbrella.

If only they would have taken this step to make maps free for public then, the amount of data from user updates and trends would have been tremendous input for MMI.

Well said man! MapMyIndia missed the woods for the trees. Their initial revenue model was built on selling GPS devices to individuals & OEMs. Well, that flopped as Maps have become a freebie today. Retrospect is always the genius, but they should have gone the Google Maps way. Free for individuals, but charging businesses (e.g. Google charges Uber for GPS navigation).

Everyone is scared about giving Google Maps too much control - it's one of the reasons that Audi, BMW & Mercedes invested in Here Maps (link). But frankly, Google Maps is to Maps what Google Search is to Search. That is, the default & best option.

[SmartCat]

Originally Posted by mpksuhas

In my opinion, too late for them to make this move. If only they would have taken this step to make maps free for public then, the amount of data from user updates and trends would have been tremendous input for MMI.

Originally Posted by GTO

Well said man! MapMyIndia missed the woods for the trees. Their initial revenue model was built on selling GPS devices to individuals & OEMs. Well, that flopped as Maps have become a freebie today.

The ET article explains MMI's business history:

- Initial focus was on revenues & profitability, and not on free app which yields little revenue and no profits.
- Last year, they clocked revenues of Rs. 200 cr
- Profitable for over a decade
- Debt free (according to Tofler.in)
- Received offers from Google & Yahoo. They refused to sell.

Can't really say for sure if the above was a wrong decision. Because if they had invested their resources in a free app, then they would've been forced to depend on private equity investors. And then hope to sell MMI to a bigger technology company.

[GTO]

Originally Posted by smartcat

Can't really say for sure if the above was a wrong decision. Because if they had invested their resources in a free app, then they would've been forced to depend on private equity investors. And then hope to sell MMI to a bigger technology company.

Very true. Good way of putting things from their perspective.

Here's another article on their early days:

In 1993, after being un-banned in India, Coca-Cola acquired the Indian cola company Thumbs Up and found itself with a problem unfamiliar to companies accustomed to developed markets: very few accurate maps existed at that point. Thumbs Up had a vast network of bottlers, each with an assigned distribution territory, but nothing depicted the overlapping of boundaries of the territories (descriptions such as “along the river” substituted for maps). Not surprisingly though, Coca-Cola wasn’t the only multinational facing such a cartographical dilemma in India: for example, a joint venture of Essar and Cellular One was struggling to figure out where to place cell phone towers.

This created an opportunity for Rakesh and Rashmi Verma, who had begun licensing US mapping software with an aim to enhance India’s map-making capabilities. They approached Coca-Cola, Cellular One, and other companies and obtained contracts to create digital maps that contained information that could aid these respective companies with business (bottlers’ territories) or topographic features (high ground suitable for cell towers). They received advance payments from the companies, which enabled them to make high-quality maps that they could later modify and sell to other clients, including the Indian Defense Department.

[mpksuhas]

Originally Posted by ankan.m.blr

Is this new version of MMI compatible with Android Auto ?

Don't think so. Its not available in the list still, though I don't know if they launched the version already in market or still under development.

Link

Originally Posted by smartcat

Can't really say for sure if the above was a wrong decision. Because if they had invested their resources in a free app, then they would've been forced to depend on private equity investors.

Yes, agree. The reason why Google is able to provide many applications & features supposedly 'free' is since they are collecting information from all the users. As someone said, data is the new oil.

What MMI is trying to do now is to duplicate the success or path taken by Google (Maps). However, I doubt by the time they are able to do that considering that they are successful , world would have moved ahead.

This is a universal challenge a company trying to copy a model faces compared to a company which came up with innovation.

In few years, Google will most probably have tabs in each car which will replace current infotainment system. Slowly they are moving to an environment which has Android Auto running on infotainment system with Android OS.

In an environment similar to that, MMI may find it increasingly difficult to grab market share.

In short, MMI in maps is facing the same fate as Noika in mobiles.

[binand]

Originally Posted by mpksuhas

Yes, of course. That is what Google perfected. However, MMI has limited leverage here since -

Also:

* Indoor plans for several buildings (eg: malls, airports etc.) It shows you the way around inside these buildings. Phoenix Market City or KIAL are places to try this out.

* Android Auto, which is where MMI still has the lead?

* Uber integration. I don't have the Uber app any more; I just book from from Google Maps (after checking whether driving myself is worth it or not).

* Bus/Metro schedules integration.

* Location Sharing: Very valuable feature when multiple vehicles are trying to coordinate, or when you want to inform someone where you are (eg: single woman-late night-cab scenario), guide someone lost to a known location etc.

* Location History: Not sure of utility except as evidence :-)

* Google Now/Calendar/Gmail integration. I was awed when the first time Google Now told me to leave for airport in next 10 minutes to reach on time for my flight. Now I take this for granted.

And:

* Waze is a Google-owned company, so hopefully its features will come to Maps someday.

* Street View, if/when it comes.

It might also be relevant to read this comparison of Google Maps and Apple Maps: https://www.justinobeirne.com/google-maps-moat/

[jassi_jeeper]

Here in Chandigarh, I found the house number search to be better with MMI. Aslo while travelling to Ludhiana, MMI had local names of villages/areas which google maps did not have. Example google maps could not search "Choti Haibowal" and "Badi Haibowal" which are the local names of "Haibowal Khurd" and "Haibowal Kalan" but MMI could.

[amitkumarsi]

Originally Posted by jassi_jeeper

Here in Chandigarh, I found the house number search to be better with MMI. Aslo while travelling to Ludhiana, MMI had local names of villages/areas which google maps did not have. Example google maps could not search "Choti Haibowal" and "Badi Haibowal" which are the local names of "Haibowal Khurd" and "Haibowal Kalan" but MMI could.

This, honestly, is where MMI can carve out its own space. Google Maps is great in the urban areas, towns, cities. However I have seen it struggle in the hinterlands of India. Whether it's West Bengal or Jammu & Kashmir or even parts of Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

And with more and more Indians traveling around to uncommon places, they would need an app that can help them out.

Probably not the best analogy but hopefully this will help explain my point. My dual phone has two SIM cards - Vodafone and BSNL. The latter sucks mostly everywhere. However in Devikulam (Kerala) as well as practically the entire of J&K or the rural parts of West Bengal like Midnapore you only have BSNL to your rescue.

[binand]

Originally Posted by amitkumarsi

This, honestly, is where MMI can carve out its own space.

So MMI has a geocoding product called eLoc: http://www.mapmyindia.com/eloc/

Google has a similar feature called Plus Codes: https://plus.codes/ (these are seen in Google Maps on Android at least).

Google launched theirs in 2014 and MMI, in 2017. The key difference is that Google's is open source whereas MMI's is proprietary.

To map the whole of India, I expect Google or MMI needs huge deployment of manpower. Google does at least two things: (a) encourage sharing of photographs of locations thereby enabling crowd sourcing, and (b) has machine learning algorithms deployed that extracts relevant information from these photographs. I don't know if MMI is doing anything similar. If they aren't, then Justin O'Beirne's Moat concept will apply in geocoding penetration in India as well.

[Turbanator]

Just tried address of my Chandigarh & Gurgaon home, both have an eLOC. So they must have done some large work already. Having a separate digital address does sound good and will be helpful surely but should they have not used existing postal codes as a prefix for ease? So for an example, my house number at Gurgaon shows up like X6W... the next door is TNF...

And why is this not being publicised, I mean uber/ ola / Zomoto, these guys should be the first one to ask for a digital address or Google is trying to restrict? Why does Googlle simply not buy mapmyindia?