Apart from the scientific break throughs, a major part in the development of homo sapiens has been played by their ability to visit unknown lands and discover new things. The trade and commerce sector, the backbone of any nation today, wouldn't have seen any growth if not for the merchants & sailors who dared to find new destinations and establish trade relationships in the faraway lands. Navigational skills, thus, had a profound role to play in the progress of human kind.

From the days of hand held compasses and finding the way using the stars, we have moved a long way forward where the artificial satellites right up there in the sky has made the navigation on land and water so much easier. Tech companies are striving to make navigation even better by providing features that we could not have imagined a few years back. Google has been at the forefront of the many of technological innovations in the space of internet on desktops as well as handheld mobile devices. One of their navigation

software, Google Maps, has been not just a great source of comfort for the common citizens, but had far greater commercial implications as we can see in the form of taxi aggregators like Uber and Ola.

Unlike USA, here in India we don't have a planned address system in place. A lot of it has to do with our civilization being centuries old and how development was mostly hindered in the pre-independence era. Finding a precise location was always an uphill task even in the urban areas. Over the years, especially after the advent of smart phones with navigational apps like Google Maps, searching a place has become far easier. Thanks to the penetration of smartphones even in the rural areas, today everyone can move around with a map in their pockets. In spite of all this, a country like India with a terrain that consists of mountains, forests and even deserts require a far more sophisticated, and yet easy to handle mapping system for the places less popular or unknown.

The development in India has mostly been restricted to the urban centres and so there is still a large chunk of area which is deprived of proper infrastructure. There are areas with sparse populations and no good roads, electricity and requisite information boards. Finding an exact spot in areas like these, especially in the case of emergencies, is nothing short of nightmare. In absence of mobile network, most of the times one has to rely on the localites for any kind of help. Even in the densely populated areas, there are pockets where pinpointing a precise location is very difficult. So there is a need for a mapping system which can help an individual, with minimal help from outside, reach the exact location he seeks. The issues of mobile networks should n't be a hindrance. There is a need to look at the problem from another perspective also. A person in distress should be able to intimate his precise spot to anyone coming for his help.

There is still a lot of scope for improvement in mapping system. The brighter part of the scenario is the fact that a lot of young & energetic entrepreneurs are utilizing their innovations to explore new possibilities across the sectors.