Snap Inc. and Niantic’s New Partnership: A Game-Changer for City-Scale AR Positioning and Experiences

Oh boy, where do I even start? So, Snap Inc. (yep, the Snapchat folks) decided to buddy up with Niantic Spatial. You remember Niantic, right? The Pokémon Go creators. Anyway, this combo is all about giving Snapchat and their funky Spectacles some city-scale geospatial pizzazz. Cool, right? Or weird. Maybe both.

Here’s the thing, lots of AR gadgets these days can figure out their spot in a room. My old brain still can’t wrap around how a headset knows it’s gliding around, but there it is. Yet, for some reason, that’s not enough. If you want multiple gizmos chatting in the same space? They need to sync up their maps, like whispering secrets in the same language. Spooky, huh?

Niantic’s been on this mission forever with their Visual Positioning System. GPS? Nah, that’s a little too wonky for this job. They want your gadgets to sync perfectly in space, making shared AR moments the latest hangout craze.

Now, pairing up with Snap Inc., they’re rolling out some wild urban-scale experiences, or at least that’s what I think they’re doing. They teased us with a video, because who reads these days? Anyway – imagine AR stuff plastered across real places, like a concert popping out of nowhere in the park. A portal? Sure, why not. Future’s crazy.

Snap and Niantic went deep into this “strategic multi-year partnership.” I guess they’re really into each other. Snap threw some money their way too, betting on getting the slickest mapping system out there. And hey, Niantic collects more user data to turbocharge their VPS. I mean, who doesn’t like a treasure trove of data? Except, like, people who think about privacy. But I digress.

Regular folk, coaxed into scanning their whereabouts to unlock lenses, end up adding to this map of theirs. It’s like a never-ending puzzle, each piece a new scan. Ya know, weighing my phone perfection against feeding Niantic more data because they’ve been doing the spatial stuff before it was cool. Remember Ingress? 2013 was a different time.

Spectacles might still be fledglings, yet with Snapchat’s gazillion users, they’re set to build a bonkers map. It’s a massive AR treasure hunt, wrapped in the softest layer of social media. Or something like that. Anyway, now if they can just make those googly-eyed glasses a thing…