Sunday, May 19

Watherunion: Zomato Announces India’s First Crowd-Supported Weather Infrastructure

Edited by Hiba Anvar
Watherunion: Zomato Announces India's First Crowd-Supported Weather Infrastructure

In a latest development, Zomato, the online food delivery platform, has announced ‘India’s first crowd-supported weather infrastructure’, weatherunion.com. This is a proprietary network of 650+ on-ground weather stations. According to Zomato CEO, it is the largest private infrastructure of its kind in our country.

Announcing the new establishment, Zomato CEO Deepinder Goyal said, “Excited to unveil India’s first crowd-supported weather infrastructure, weatherunion.com. A proprietary network of 650+ on-ground weather stations, it is the largest private infrastructure of its kind in our country.”

The weather station will provide localized, real-time information on key weather parameters such as temperature, humidity, wind speed, rainfall etc. Currently, the weather station is available across 45 large cities, and now the company is planning to expand to other Indian cities as well.

As per Zomato’s CEO, the rich data holds significant potential in unlocking weather use cases for enterprises and research institutes. Zomato has already collaborated with CAS – IIT Delhi and is expecting to collaborate with institutes and companies and gain benefit from it.

Zomato stated that it was crucial for them to access the real-time weather information to make the right business decisions thereby they developed a solution. 

“We are now opening up free access to this (through an API) to all institutions and companies in the country. Wait. What? Free? Really? Yes, we believe that this data is too valuable to keep to ourselves or to monetise; therefore, as a Zomato Giveback, we are opening up access to this data to everyone for public good. Multiple companies and public institutions should real-time weather data, to boost the productivity of our economy,” Deepinder added.

The company has invited volunteers willing to provide them with space on their premises to install the weather stations. Many of the Zomato employees have already hosted weather stations at their homes.