Nepalese Startup Seeks Crowdfunding to Put Kathmandu on the Digital Map

A typical Kathmandu alleyway - or "galli" - which you're really going to need help navigating! (Image source: maximumadventure.net)

A Nepalese brother and sister team is hoping to put the nation’s capital Kathmandu on the map. Literally, and digitally. The aim – in their “GalliGalli” project which is now seeking crowdfunding – is to create a resource for locals and tourists alike that will cover the city’s venues, public transport, and streets and alleyways (called “galli”).

To get this started, the duo – Sakar Pudasaini (pictured below) and his sister, Surabhi – have launched a fund-raiser on the Kickstarter-esque site StartSomeGood. The GalliGalli project page is here. It’s aiming to get $16,423 to get started up and running, and has raised just over $4,000 so far this month with 21 days left in the campaign. A team member tells us via email that Surabhi’s background is in social science and journalism, while Sakar has experience at tech companies in Washington DC; both have travelled extensively before returning home. It was when Sakar got back to Kathmandu after some time away and couldn’t remember his way through the city’s labyrinthine alleys that the idea formed for a very lean and socially-minded startup that would bring the ancient city into the 21st century.

Currently, Google Maps has climbed to the heights of Nepal’s capital and does show bus stops and some basic directions, but it’s far from enough to help a tourist or local in getting around. Speaking for GalliGalli, Eileen Guo tells me that the project will be “using OpenStreetMap, an open source version of Google Maps, to do the main city-mapping, and the transportation layer will display much like it does in Google Maps.” The open source element will help save money too. They’re being frugal in other ways as well, and the team’s expenditure on office space is zero. With the $16,000 in seed funding that they’re seeking via StartSomeGood, GalliGalli will be able to run for four whole months.

As for financing and monetization going forward, Eileen explains:

GalliGalli is non-profit and [the two founders] are looking at funding in two primary ways. Once they have their beta version, they’ll be looking for grant money from major foundations, as well as corporate and government partnerships. I believe they may also be looking at the possibility of eventually charging for-profit organizations for some of their data.

[Updated] Sakar stresses that the basic service will always be free for regular folks. He elaborates:

Over time we will rely on a model that mixes grants, community-funding (we are big believers in the community-sourced idea), ad revenue, paid apps targeted at higher-end consumers, and ways to monetize the data we gather. We will have a ton of data about government services in Nepal which we think has value to people like journalists, NGO’s, etc. Think of that bit like the LinkedIn model: premier users pay to package and search data that is already free, in convenient ways.

What we will not do is charge for the basic service. We think putting this kind of data in the hands of people is altering the power dynamics between the authorities and those who respond to them. So the first few years will be external funding heavy as we move to greater self-sufficiency.

Check out the GalliGalli pledge page below to see how your backing could also net you some unique gifts from Nepal, and learn more about the project’s social ambitions in the video at bottom.