In a bold move, Ola co-founder and CEO Bhavish Aggarwal announced on Friday that the company has fully transitioned from Google Maps to its proprietary mapping solution, Ola Maps. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Aggarwal revealed, “We used to spend 100 crores a year, but we’ve made that 0 this month by moving completely to our in-house Ola Maps!”
This significant shift follows the company’s recent migration from Microsoft Azure to its bespoke cloud infrastructure, designed to support Ola’s ecosystem and its large language model (LLM), Krutrim.
Aggarwal also disclosed plans to enhance Ola Maps with advanced features, including street view, neural radiance fields (NERFs), indoor images, 3D maps, drone maps, and more, in the near future.
Ola Maps is built on the foundation of OpenStreetMap, an open-source, freely accessible map with an open license, augmented by proprietary data from Ola. This strategic development indicates Ola’s commitment to reducing dependency on external services while enhancing its technological capabilities.
While Google Maps is free for consumer use, businesses like Ola incur substantial fees for incorporating its Application Programming Interface (API) into their services. By developing an in-house solution, Ola aims to eliminate these recurring costs, though initial deployment costs for hardware and software to maintain Ola Maps are expected.
Ola Maps will extend beyond the company’s ride-hailing platform and electric vehicle services. The Ola Maps API will be accessible to developers for both Android and iOS platforms, enabling integration into various apps and services through Krutrim Cloud.
This strategic move not only underscores Ola’s technological ambitions but also positions it as a significant player in the mapping and navigation domain, offering new opportunities for developers and businesses alike.
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