With a view to compete with its rivals, Microsoft India has announced the launch of its map search services in India. With the help of Microsoft's Live Search Maps for India, the users will be able to acquire loads of information regarding geographical locations, places of interest and business listing. The new facility will run on PC as well as mobile phones. Besides Microsoft, other companies like Google, Yahoo and MapMyIndia are already offering same sort of services. Microsoft's India unit in Hyderabad called India Development Centre (IDC) has developed the first version of the local mapping service.

 

The detailed listings and street maps of nine cities of India will be available in Microsoft's mapping service. Along with the four metros of the country, the cities of Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune, Ahmedabad and Jaipur will also reap the benefits of the service. Besides these, the users can access business listings across 29 cities and highway networks of 20,000 cities and towns.

 

One of the interesting features of mapping service is that it comes absolutely free. The company is said to raise the revenue through advertisement. At this point of time, Microsoft is focused on pulling more and more consumers for its mapping service. Speaking about the future plans, a company official stated that after certain period of time Microsoft will develop its mapping service by including features like landmark-based driving directions, satellite imagery etc.