In an interview with TimesTech, Sameer Sankhe, Chief Digital Officer at Genesys International Corporation, discusses the company’s two-decade journey in transforming India’s digital mapping landscape. From pioneering LiDAR and 3D digital twins to leveraging AI for high-definition mapping and conversational navigation, he explains how Genesys is building the “New India Map Stack” to support urban planning, disaster management, autonomous driving, and sustainable growth across the nation.
Read the full interview here:
TimesTech: How has Genesys contributed to the evolution of digital mapping in India over the past two decades?
Sameer: Think of India’s digital transformation journey – we’ve seen revolutionary changes with Aadhaar and UPI, right? Well, there’s another transformation happening quietly in the background that touches 80% of all business decisions – spatial intelligence. That’s where Genesys has been playing a pivotal role for over 20 years.
We started when digital mapping in India was in its infancy more than two decades back. Back then, most maps were basic 2D representations. Today, we’re creating living, breathing 3D digital twins of entire cities. We’ve essentially evolved from being map makers to becoming the architects of India’s spatial intelligence, which is an important national digital infrastructure.
Our country is likely to add over 300 million people to our cities by 2050, that’s almost the entire US population. It’s one of the biggest urbanization movements in the history. At Genesys we have evolved our technology to meet these challenges. We pioneered the use of LiDAR technology, mobile mapping systems, and even backpack-mounted sensors that can map the narrowest lanes of places like Dharavi to map the entire city into highly accurate 3D Digital Twin.
What makes us unique is our constellation of sensors with nationwide capability. We’re not just mapping; we’re building what we call the New India Map Stack – a comprehensive spatial framework that’s as transformative as the India Stack has been for digital payments.
TimesTech: Can you share insights into the large-scale mapping projects for Pune, Varanasi, and Mecca, and their key challenges?
Sameer: Each of these projects presented unique challenges that pushed our technological capabilities to new limits.
Let’s start with Pune. After the devastating floods of July 24, 2024, when extreme rainfall struck, we knew traditional monitoring wasn’t enough.
Our 3D digital twin captures elevation profile for every square meter, instantly identifying vulnerable low-lying areas. We layer this with flood simulation technology. Our disaster management solutions go beyond this. For example, for other urban bodies our data and tools help them manage other disasters such as fire. Urban planners can now run “what-if” scenarios – simulating different rainfall intensities, planning evacuations, or optimizing emergency vehicle routes through flooded streets. For fire response, our models show building heights, access routes, etc.
Mumbai presented a different scale altogether. Working with BMC on a ₹155 crore project, we’re creating a complete 3D digital twin of one of the world’s most complex urban environments. Imagine mapping every building, every street, even informal settlements where the houses are just a few feet apart- all while the city continues its relentless pace. Imagine mapping Mumbai’s Dharavi on a busy Monday or navigating Varanasi’s ancient.
We tackle this through what we call the Genesys constellation – an arsenal of cutting-edge sensors from aerial LiDAR to backpack-mounted systems that can squeeze through the narrowest lanes.
We have also developed a range of solutions for urban planning, such as property tax.
Genesys’ expertise goes beyond technology. Our deep talent pool of surveyors, content production, software architects/applications who with their deep expertise and experience find a solution to every problem on the ground. Our data scientists who can clean the messiest point clouds, and engineers who innovate to handle unique challenges posed by our country- ensure we deliver highly accurate digital replicas even in the most challenging conditions. We’ve learned to treat each challenge as an opportunity to push the boundaries of what’s possible in geospatial technology.
TimesTech: How is Genesys leveraging AI and HD mapping to enhance accuracy and support industries like autonomous driving?
Sameer: AI isn’t just enhancing our maps – it’s revolutionizing how we create and update them. We’ve developed proprietary AI/ML algorithms that can extract incredible detail from our 360-degree street imagery. For instance, our AI automatically identifies and catalogs every street sign, traffic signal, pole, and even storefronts. What once required armies of human analysts now has been done at scale. All this helps us make our maps more accurate, and updates are more frequent. For Advanced Driver Assistance System (ADAS) driving, this precision helps not just where the road is, but its exact curvature, gradient, and every sign along the way. We call these High Definition (HD) maps. Their engineering-grade representations are accurate to within centimeters. They help us keep our roads safer for driving.
The making of 3D digital twins involves the use of AI to scale up the accuracy and nuances of 3D Digital Twins.
Now let’s move to the conversational AI. Imagine, you’re driving through Mumbai, and instead of fumbling with tiny map buttons or typing addresses, you just talk to your car like you’d talk to a friend. That’s exactly what we’ve built – a conversation AI that completely reimagines how you interact with in-car navigation. We’ve fed our system tens of millions of data points from maps and places across India, teaching it to think like a local, not like a computer.
The magic happens when you speak naturally. Say you’re heading out and casually mention, “Can you take me to that Taj in Bandra?” Your car instantly knows you mean the Taj Lands’ End hotel – not some random building with ‘Taj’ in the name. No typing. No scrolling through search results. Just understanding.
But here’s where it gets really interesting. Mid-journey, you remember you’re hungry. “Hey, on my way to Taj, can you take me to a good seafood restaurant?” Without missing a beat, the AI recalculates your route, finds a highly-rated seafood spot that barely adds time to your trip, and smoothly guides you there first.
What makes this special isn’t just the technology – it’s that it works in multiple Indian languages. Whether you prefer Hindi, Tamil, Marathi, or any other regional language, the system gets you. We’ve broken down the barrier between advanced mapping technology and everyday drivers. You don’t need to be tech-savvy. You just need to know how to have a conversation.
This isn’t your typical GPS that speaks in robotic directions. It’s like having a knowledgeable local sitting in your passenger seat, one who knows every street, every restaurant, and exactly what you mean – even when you’re not being perfectly clear.
TimesTech: What role does geospatial technology play in governance, urban planning, and infrastructure?
Sameer: Geospatial technology is becoming the backbone of modern governance. Think about it – whether it’s planning a new metro line, managing property records, or responding to disasters, location is central to every decision.
In urban planning, our digital twins are transforming how cities develop. The metro cities, for instance, can use our 3D models to run “what-if” scenarios. Want to know how a new flyover will impact the existing settlements and assets? Or how monsoon flooding might affect different neighborhoods? Our digital twins provide these answers before a single brick is laid.
For land records and titling, precision mapping eliminates disputes and brings transparency. When you can definitively show property boundaries with centimeter accuracy, backed by temporal data showing how land use has changed over time, it helps land administration. This is particularly crucial in India where land records have historically been complex and sometimes contradictory.
Our technology also enables better service delivery. Municipalities could use our data to optimize everything from garbage collection routes to emergency response times. Urban bodies have used our mapping which helped identify unregistered properties, directly boosting municipal revenues that fund development.
What’s powerful is how this technology democratizes planning. With our digital twins, even smaller urban bodies can access the same sophisticated planning tools as major metros. This is crucial as, according to NITI Aayog’s 2021 report on ‘Reforms in Urban Planning Capacity in India’, nearly 65% of the country’s 7,933 urban settlements lack a master plan
TimesTech: What’s your vision for Genesys and the future of geospatial technology in India?
Sameer: Our vision is audacious yet grounded in India’s needs. We’re building a world-class tech stack that makes spatial intelligence ubiquitous, and it’s an essential digital infrastructure for a nation’s growing economy.
The future we see is one where every decision – from where to open a new store to how to evacuate a city during disasters – is informed by precise, real-time spatial data. Our New India Map Stack will be the foundation for this transformation.
We’re moving beyond static maps to creating autonomous, predictive digital twins. Imagine city infrastructure that self-diagnoses problems, traffic systems that optimize themselves, and disaster management systems that predict and prevent rather than just respond. This isn’t science fiction – we’re building these capabilities today.
As India adds 300 million people to its cities by 2050, the challenges will be unprecedented. But so are the opportunities. We envision our technology enabling cities that aren’t just smart, but adaptive and resilient. Cities that can grow sustainably while improving quality of life.
We’re also democratizing access to spatial intelligence. Through AI and natural language processing, we’re making our advanced mapping tools accessible to everyone – from large corporations to small businesses, from urban planners to individual citizens.
The next decade will see geospatial technology embedded in a lot of decisions we make – from the ADAS-enabled vehicles on our roads to the IoT sensors in our buildings. Genesys will be at the forefront, not just mapping India, but helping build a spatially intelligent nation that can meet the challenges of the 21st century.
Our ultimate goal? To ensure that as India transforms sustainably, no one gets left behind – whether it’s mapping the narrowest lanes of Dharavi or enabling precision agriculture in rural areas. That’s the future we’re building, one map at a time.
