Did Apple Acquire 3D Mapping Company C3? [Video]

A Swedish 3D mapping company named C3 Technologies was purchased by a western company last month, reports MacRumors.

Saab AB says it sold its 57.8% stake in the company for approximately $150 million and promised not to tell who the buyer was.

We have promised not to say who the buyer is. But there are no Chinese or other Asian companies. It is a company in the Western world, says one of Saab today after the deal is worth 1 billion [kronor].


MacRumors suggests that perhaps Apple purchased the company who began demoing its technology on Android and iOS devices at CES this year. The technology was formally classified and used for missile targeting. Technology Review describes how they create maps that are 360° explorable with every building, tree, and landmark captured in 3D.

C3's models are generated with little human intervention. First, a plane equipped with a custom-designed package of professional-grade digital single-lens reflex cameras takes aerial photos. Four cameras look out along the main compass points, at oblique angles to the ground, to image buildings from the side as well as above. Additional cameras (the exact number is secret) capture overlapping images from their own carefully determined angles, producing a final set that contains all the information needed for a full 3-D rendering of a city's buildings. Machine-vision software developed by C3 compares pairs of overlapping images to gauge depth, just as our brains use stereo vision, to produce a richly detailed 3-D model.

Although the report offers no substantial evidence that Apple made the purchase, it seems like an acquisition the company would be interested in. Apple recently purchased the Placebase and Poly9 mapping companies and has been hiring talent to help it build a new maps service. The C3 website has been shut down; however, a few videos of their technology can be seen below...

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