Nokia's HERE launches community mapping project in India

HERE, a Nokia business, has launched a community mapping pilot project in India. The project in India is part of an ongoing series of pilot programs that HERE is using to enhance its community mapping capabilities and tap the knowledge of local experts.

"The first major country where the company will combine its industrial data collection methods with a crowd mapping initiative," according to the company.

"As part of the pilot program, with a team of more than 1,000 people in India, the regional HERE will work directly with handpicked local experts from more than a dozen universities around the country, such as Mount Carmel College in Bangalore and the SAL Institute of Technology in Ahmedabad," the company mentioned in its statement.

"Using Map Creator, a HERE tool that allows people to add missing streets, bridges, points of interests (POIs) and other information to the map, these local experts can share insider knowledge of the areas they know like the back of their hand and, in turn, put their communities on the map," said the statement.

"To maintain accuracy and ensure map quality, HERE has built a community map moderation system that allows both our HERE team as well as the community at large to verify edits before integrating them into the base map," according to the press release.

"Once integrated, these changes will become available within days to all users across the wide range of HERE customers, including automakers, personal navigation device manufactures, mobile device makers and web and enterprise clients," it said.

Given India's diverse urbanization patterns, HERE will work with a variety of communities across the country. In smaller towns and cities, locals will help HERE build out road networks, while in densely populated areas contributors will provide information about points of interest and capture changes. HERE has already rolled out industrial capture methods in some of these areas, but local communities can further improve and humanize HERE Maps.

"HERE will employ its global crowd sourcing pilot program to tap the expert 'know-where' of a billion Indian consumers. This initiative will help HERE gain a sizeable competitive edge with broader and denser mapping coverage in one of the most multi-faceted geographies globally," said Neil Shah, Research Director, Counterpoint Research.

"In vibrant, fast-growing countries like India a community mapping approach, paired with input from the right experts, means HERE can keep pace with the ever-evolving landscape so that our maps are never obsolete. Equally important, however, is not just the pure number of people contributing to our map-making community, but that we work with the right experts," said Michael Halbherr, EVP of HERE.