SAN Metropolitan plc announced the launch of a satellite based geographical navigation service in the Ethiopian capital.
The company has been working for the last three years to develop the system in Addis Ababa according to Seife-Selassie Ayalew (Ph.D), General Manager of SAN, speaking at the launch event held at the Radisson Blu hotel late last week.

The groundwork undertaken in the last three years included mapping and data encoding activities to be used by the system he explained.

The Meri-Ethiopian satellite navigation system developed by the company will soon be commercially available according to Dr. Seife-Selassie. The service expects to alleviate problems associated with locating places in Addis Ababa due to the absence of stratified data of places and an easily accessible address system he said.

The US made device will help both tourists and local people locate places very easily helping to alleviate traffic congestion claimed Dr. Seife-Selassie.

It is expected that divers will pay an estimated 7000 birr to acquire the device that is currently able to locate 800 governmental and non-governmental organizations, 1,000 cafeterias, 2,300 restaurants, 1,000 guest houses and hotels, more than 30 museums and galleries and an estimated 150 travel agencies he noted.

The financing for the project is being supported by the World Bank through the year long matching grant fund: ‘The Ethiopian Sustainable Tourism Development Program.’

Source: The Reporter