Brief

Microsoft launches Live Search Maps for India

Microsoft India recently launched Live Search Maps for India that offers users access to detailed listings and street maps for nine Cities, business listings across 29 Cities and access to highway networks to 20,000 cities and towns.

Live Search Maps for India is on Microsoft’s Live Search Service, thereby allowing users to search for geographical information, places of general interest and business listings on both the PC and Mobile. This is the first version of its local mapping service for India with the key features developed by the Microsoft India Development Centre (MSIDC) based in Hyderabad.

Speaking on the launch, Rishi Srivastava, Consumer & Online Marketing Operations Head, Microsoft India, said, “This is the first version of Live Search Maps for India and Microsoft will continue to introduce new features and improvements.”

The key features of Live Search Maps for India include street maps, location search, business listing search, routing or directions for navigation and options for users to print and share collections through e-mail as well as blogs on Windows Live.

“After recent innovations for Live Search such as image search, video search, local search, xRank and instant answers, we have rolled out Live Search Maps on our search platform to enable people to learn, discover, and explore specific locations in India,” said Srivastava.

The search includes addresses, roads, localities, landmarks, detailed street maps and places of general interest like monuments, restaurants, hotels and other places of interest across nine Indian cities namely Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune, Ahmedabad and Jaipur.

“In the near future we plan to add new features such as landmark-based driving directions, collections search, options for enterprise customers and developer community to create custom mash-ups, along with satellite imagery and related features for India and key cities,” said, Gurpreet S Pall, General Manager-Live Search and MSN Technologies, Microsoft India Development Center.

Live Search Maps India is powered by the Microsoft Virtual Earth platform, draws information through multiple local vendor sources such as NavTeq and uses Government of India approved data.