NAVTEQ has announced the company's expansion of designated R and D Global Development Centers (GDC) to include operations in Mumbai, India.

The center will employ 150 R and D team members and significantly enhance NAVTEQ's R and D capabilities which support Map and Content design and development activities for the global NAVTEQ product portfolio.

The center joins the roster of NAVTEQ's other global R and D centers located in the U.S., Germany, UK, Korea, Bosnia and Slovakia.

Efforts to expand the company's R and D presence in India began in January 2008, with the original center reaching its current capacity earlier this year. The new R and D GDC is close to the Mumbai International Airport as well as the NAVTEQ's Mumbai-based DMO production center.

"India is strategically important to NAVTEQ on several levels," stated Larry Kaplan, president and CEO, NAVTEQ.

"It represents a significant marketplace for our customers, which is reflected in our growing product portfolio for India, and at the same time we view our operations there in both R and D and production as critical to our global efforts to provide our customers with innovative, high quality location content."

"The deep technical talents in India, which will continue to be fostered by the academic institutions throughout the country, were a key consideration in our R and D expansion plans," explained Amreesh Modi, executive vice president and CTO, NAVTEQ.

"The Mumbai R and D GDC is set to play an important role in our end-to-end product development, impacting architecture, design, software implementation and ultimately delivery to our customers."