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Thursday, February 20, 2020

Google to Wind up its Station Project Globally, RailTel to Continue Services

Google is all set to pull the plug off from the ambitious Google Station project. Google launched this public WiFi offerings in railway stations of India in 2015 by partnering telecom arm of Indian Railways, RailTel and now connects more than 400 stations. 

Later Google Station was expanded to other countries - Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria, the Philippines, South Africa, Thailand, and Vietnam with local ISPs as partner. 

In a blog post by Caesar Sengupta, VP - Payments and Next Billion Users of Google points out that Indians are getting cheapest 4G data and better LTE coverage, hence they will wind up Station services while they will continue to work with 'partners to transition existing sites so they can remain useful resources for the community.' The post also mentions their initial target of reaching 400 stations was completed in June 2018. 


The shut down will go global, as Google will pass the operations to its local partners like RailTel in India and Think WiFi in South Africa. RailTel in a seperate statement confirms they will continue same services as contract between two companies would end by May 2020.  

This announcement does come in a time, while Tata  backed Nelco is all set off to launch in-flight connectivity, starting with Vistara. Vistara is a JV between Tata Sons & Singapore Airlines. 

Well on my personal take on Google Station, it was pretty successful during initial days and in tier II and III cities where good internet connectivity is still not available. The headline could be 'Jio killed Google Station', as Google pointed out regarding cheap mobile data. 

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