Global mapping solutions provider TomTom, which has recently set up a new facility in Pune, said that the centre is an important part of its global functioning and will serve customers around the world.

“Our facility in India is super important for the execution of our strategy...India is for us the future, an important market. Today it is a small market for us in terms of revenue, but from a talent point of view it is fantastic. So we don’t see our Indian office as a strictly related office for India...it is a global office that works for all of the company,” Alain De Taeye Board Member, TomTom, told BusinessLine .

He said the company has been hiring hundreds of people over the last few years and will continue to do that as and when it is required in the future. The company has around 4,500 employees around the world and 1,000 in India, mostly software engineers who are working on mapping data worldwide.

“We are a location technology company that delivers products for the automotive world, but also for the non-automotive world -- the enterprise world, where we have customers like Microsoft and Uber. Our Pune office is where we develop a lot of the software that is used in the map creation and map maintenance worldwide,” he said.

TomTom’s competition in India

When asked about the competitions with companies such as MapmyIndia in India, Taeye said TomTom has more advantage because of its global scale.

“MapMyIndia is a good company and they make decent products. But, we think over time, because of our global scale and the fact that we have processes that are much more advanced in terms of technology, we will compete fiercely with MapMyIndia...they do have good products, but they are a local company,” he said.

He said TomTom has map data for the whole world and is offering its APIs on top of the map data to allow developers to develop applications that are location-related in an easier way.

He added that the company has not only opportunities from the automotive companies, but also from enterprises, government and satellite navigation providers in India.