In a bid to improve its mapping service on IOS, Apple has acquired Locationary, a crowdsourced location data company that creates a platform for aggregating and managing local business listing and also helps businesses keep their information up to date.
Apple confirmed the acquisition but refused to disclose additional details about the plans it has for the company or its business information management technology, “Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans,” said Alan Hely, Apple’s senior director of Corporate Communications in Europe, via email.
Apple came under fire from customers when it launched Maps in iOS 6 and has been criticized by users for being significantly less accurate than Google Maps. This prompted an open letter by Apple Ceo Tim Cook apologizing and promised that the service will be improved. The acquisition of Locationary may be related to that effort.
According to Locationary’s website, its Saturn platform manages 175 million business profiles from 253 feeds and repositories. The technology’s goal is to standardize the data and keep it up to date. Locationary has built a business on collecting, verifying, and updating information on businesses around the world and Apple wants to seize the opportunity to improve its maps on the IOS powered devices.
