Today during a keynote interview at AllThingsD’s D9, Google Executive Chairman (and former longtime CEO) made a key announcement: Google has recently renewed its partnership with Apple over mapping and search. In other words, don’t look for a new version of Maps on iOS at next month’s WWDC.
So, why is this important? Apple has long shipped every iPod Touch, iPhone, and iPad with a Maps application powered by Google. It’s great (though arguably not as good as its Android counterpart). But Apple and Google are competing fiercely in the mobile market, and every time someone runs a search using Maps from an iOS device, Apple is handing Google a little more data that could be used to further improve their local products.
Apple is rumored to be working on its own map service — it’s even admitted publicly that’s it’s building an improved traffic database — but it sounds like we won’t be seeing that yet. This is in line with a report from 9to5mac last week.