Google wants to add more internet users from India and for that to happen it has recently launched Hindi language support to its Voice Search app. With already 200 million users online from India and 5 million new users coming online every month, most of these users are not familiar with the English language. This becomes a big barrier for the users to come online on a daily basis.
The company has over 700 volunteers in the country who help in reading out the search queries across various locations to get the correct results even if you are at a busy street or a loud restaurant.
Google also announced the Indian Language Internet Alliance (ILIA) in partnership with the likes of ABP News, Amar Ujala Publications, IDB Digital, Firstouch, HinKhoj, NDTV, Network 18, Oneindia.com, and Times Internet Limited among others. The alliance’s focus is to bring regional content to internet users in India.
“Our aim is to get 500 million users online by 2017,” said Rajan Anandan, VP and MD, Google India at the recent Google event in the capital.
Google recently launched a Hindi keyboard and also launched Google Maps in Hindi and voice navigation in Hindi for Indian users.
With a lot of focus on the Indian market from a lot of technology giants, Google too wants to tap into the market which is still at a nascent stage. With more than 80 per cent of the population not on the smartphone platform, Google plans to localise lot of its products.