Apple announced that it has agreed to purchase Locationary. This would improve its position in the mapping services. Locationary, which is based in Toronto, owns the technology that improves navigation and search results for mobile apps. It would increase commerce and advertising performance.
Apple spokeswoman Kristin Huguet said that the company is buying smaller tech firms from time to time and don’t usually discuss their purpose or plans. The cost of the deal was not disclosed as well. Apple launched its own maps service last year in the hopes of dethroning Google’s service on its devices but Apple failed miserably.
Directions to target locations were incomplete. Monuments and buildings were not in their proper places. Data regarding public transportation systems was missing. Users reacted badly to Apple’s map app and CEO Tim Cook gave an apology.
Locationary specializes in enhanced local business data. It will be a good addition to Apple’s Maps. It can be used to update business location and status information. Its Saturn product is a database that collects and distributes business-related information such as merchant and marketing data. Companies that connect with the product’s API so that it can upload, export, or change information. Companies can also download profiles for other businesses in the Saturn database.
Analysts see Apple as needing to improve their map product if they want to compete against Google. Adding Locationary will help the company make their maps more accurate. Its competitor Google has agreed to acquire Waze, which is a crowd sourced mapping startup. The deal was said to be worth around $1 billion. Waze has around 50 million users who contribute real time traffic data that improves mapping out traffic in an area.
Other big players, such as Nokia, are also trying to get into the maps business. This is because mapping has become a vital factor in the time of smartphones and tablets.
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