One of the apps I use most on my iPhone--indeed, perhaps the app I use the most--is a product dependent on technology from Apple's rival, Google. It's the Maps app, and as a person lacking any innate sense of direction, I use it just about wherever I go. Ever since the iPhone first came on the scene in 2007, Apple has been dependent on Google Maps. But there have been hints that Apple, at least since 2009, has been planning a rival service. In that year, it bought a mapping company called Placebase; last year, it scooped up a 3-D mapping company called Poly9. This week, 9to5Mac confirms that Apple has now purchased a third mapping company, C3 Technologies, which mysteriously shut down in August following its acquisition from a then-unnamed buyer.

Technology Review profiled C3 back in April; the Swedish company has adapted missile-targeting tech into what some have called "Google Maps on steroids." Have a look for yourself, with this map of Oslo, Norway: