Ola Cabs exits Google Maps, saves Rs 100 cr by transitioning to Ola Maps

Ola Cabs' shift from Google Maps to their in-house Ola Maps has led to significant annual savings of around Rs 100 crore

Ride-hailing company Ola Cabs has transitioned from using Google Maps to its own Ola Maps, resulting in substantial annual savings of around 00 crore.
 

Bhavish Aggarwal, chief executive officer (CEO) of Ola Cabs, said the move followed its departure from Azure last month.
 

In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Aggarwal said, “After Azure’s exit last month, we’ve fully exited Google maps. We used to spend Rs 100 crore a year but we’ve made that zero this month by moving completely to our in-house Ola maps! Check your Ola app and update if needed.”
 

He further said that Ola Cabs will see a number of features in the coming months. They include street view, neural radiance fields (NERFs), indoor images, 3D maps and drone maps, among others.
 

Three months following Ola Group's full transition of its operations to Krutrim, its proprietary AI company, the company severed its partnership with Microsoft’s Azure.
 

Aggarwal had previously announced in May on X that the company would terminate its Azure ties and transfer all operations to Krutrim within a week. At the launch of Krutrim AI, the company also introduced plans for Cloud services and mapping solutions.

In October 2021, Ola acquired GeoSpoc, a Pune-based company specialising in geospatial services. Ola Maps now supports the mapping requirements of its primary ride-hailing application. Additionally, the company revealed intentions to integrate Ola Maps into its electric two-wheelers through a software update in January.

Ola's solid-state batteries

Meanwhile, Ola Electric is currently in the early stages of researching solid-state batteries for its electric scooters. According to Aggarwal, the company aims to integrate these innovative batteries into the scooters by next year.
 

“We are in very early stages of our experimentation on solid state batteries,” Aggarwal had said.

Ola expects that these batteries, to be produced at its new gigafactory in Tamil Nadu, will power the popular scooters

and align with the Indian government's battery manufacturing incentive scheme.