The purchase of the company called WifiSLAM is reported to have been made for $20 million.
According to a recent report in the Wall Street Journal, Apple has just closed an acquisition agreement with a company called WifiSLAM, a business focused on a unique form of geolocation.
The purchase was of a company that concentrates primarily on building this technology.
What makes the geolocation technology from WifiSLAM as unique as it is, is that it makes it possible to obtain user positioning data while an individual is indoors – a considerable hurdle in geolocaiton until now. It is estimated that Apple paid approximately $20 million for the acquisition of the company based in Silicon Valley.
The geolocation technology company is a two year old startup that focuses on mobile apps.
These applications are able to detect the location of a user while inside a building through the use of Wi-Fi signaling technology. This geolocation technology has been offered to various app developers for use for indoor mapping and a number of different social networking and retail app purposes. It currently employs a handful of people. Joseph Huang, one of the company’s co-founders, is a former software engineering intern from Google.
This acquisition is not coming as a surprise to many in the industry. This is particularly true for those who have been keeping a close eye on geolocation developments in the war between Apple and Google in the environment of online and mobile mapping. Following the disaster that has been connected to iOS Maps through bad reviews, long lists of user complaints, and even statements against the service by the Australian government after unsuspecting users were sent into the outback, Apple is looking to make some important new moves.
Apple chief executive officer, Tim Cook, made a public apology last year, in which he admitted that the company needs to produce a product with higher quality. The acquisition of unique and forward thinking geolocation technology such as that which is offered by WifiSLAM appears to be precisely the type of direction that the company is seeking to take for the next release of this product.
The new satID GeoSim is a first in the industry for state of the art tech.
The latest release from Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc. a leading provider of National Security Solutions has unveiled its new state of the art Geolocation technology that will be used for everything from commercial purposes to military functions.
This is a first of its kind test and training system designed for satellite operators for aggressive performance protection.
This geolocation technology is unlike any other that is currently available as is preserves the function and performance of vital commercial and military SATCOM. satID GeoSim generates the Radio Frequency (RF) signals that happen when interference such as hostile jamming is discovered by satellites.
This new geolocation tech can be integrated with the RF interference management products currently leading the industry.
Those products are from SAT, a subsidiary of Kratos. However, the geolocation also works for interference monitoring through Monics. The satID GeoSims works by sending actual signals that would represent any worldwide locations on the gorund, satellite combination or pattern, RF bands, and global reference emitter locations for training and testing purposes.
This way, geolocation pros are capable of using the technology to train at any time and in any place without having to wait for an actual interference to happen. This type of capability provides the technology with the ability to provide professionals with the chance to improve their knowledge and techniques. The outcome is that the trained individuals are capable of mastering more accurate and faster detection, location, diagnosis, and mitigation of link interference through SATCOM.
According to the RT Logic business area manager, Steve Williams, “Our dependence on military and commercial SATCOM for mission-critical communications and data transport has never been higher.” He went on to say that this new product is a cost effective and powerful opportunity for training operators for improved interference management overall, from the point of detection to removal.
The company explained in a press release that the geolocation tech is based on the simulated precision channel technology from RT Logic. It provides operators with significant flexibility and capability for both testing and training purposes with the potential to considerably improve outcomes.
