Snap Inc. and Niantic Partnership Paves the Way for City-scale AR Positioning and Experiences

Okay, so get this. Snap Inc., you know, the Snapchat guys with their Spectacles (those AR glasses), have teamed up with Niantic Spatial. Why? To jazz up their geospatial abilities or something. It’s like both are shaking hands and saying, “Hey, let’s share toys.” Snap gets city-wide positioning powers, and Niantic? Well, they get a mountain of user data to soup up their Visual Positioning System.

So, AR gadgets today can figure out where they are in a room. Sort of like a cat checking out a new house, right? But if you want two devices to, you know, play nice in the sandbox, they need a shared map or something. Think of it like two friends trying to find each other at a concert without their phones buzzing “You’re here!” They need to see the same big bouncy ball bouncing or whatever.

Niantic’s been dreaming about this shared map thing for ages. GPS? Nah, not precise enough. But their system could let gadgets say, “Hey, we’re in the same space,” so everyone sees the magic happen — like, for real.

So, Niantic calls up Snap and says, “Let’s make something cool!” A concept video drops showing wild city adventures that might blow our minds. Seriously, imagine AR Lenses doing their thing with pinpoint accuracy. Picture this: a virtual concert right where the old guy feeds pigeons daily or a portal opening at that random park bench — only if you walk over there.

Sounds nuts, right? It’s like opening public spots to all sorts of craziness and creativity. It’s not just any collab — they’re throwing some cash into it too, with Snap investing big time in Niantic. Kinda strategic, if you ask me.

Snap’s gonna ride on the coattails of a killer positioning system, and Niantic? They’re gobbling up all this new data like it’s candy. Their Visual Positioning System isn’t just aiming to spread; it’s evolving, hungry for more user scans to stay ever-fresh.

Imagine you’re chilling with your Spectacles, and a notification pops up saying, “Unlock this lens by doing a quick scan!” Boom — you’ve just contributed to the global AR map. Wild. Niantic’s always been kind of a wizard with geo-stuff, remember Ingress and Pokemon Go? Yeah, since then, they’ve stepped up their spatial game — shedding their gaming wings to focus on real-world magic with this VPS.

Oh, and Snapchat’s army of 900 million users? Yeah, that could supercharge both Snap and Niantic into having the biggest geospatial AR library anywhere. Or, y’know, something like that.