SAN FRANCISCO, May 29 — Nearly a year after TechCrunch reported that the company is rebuilding Apple Maps to better compete with Google’s highly accurate and detailed Maps platform, Apple announced that a collection of sensor-equipped vehicles will be trekking across Canada this summer to improve Apple’s current road and geography data in the country.

Compared to Google Maps, Apple’s rendition of the service has always been quite lackluster; in fact, shortly after its initial launch in 2012, the platform gained a reputation for being so inaccurate that CEO Tim Cook actually apologised for all the frustration that resulted from using the service.

Though Apple Maps has seen significant improvements since Cook published that open letter seven years ago, the service continued to drag behind Google Maps.

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As a result, company revealed last year that it was working on a complete overhaul.

On Monday, Apple announced that it is releasing a fleet of Apple Maps vehicles to document “road details, signage and landmarks — all to make the most accurate and useful Maps experience possible.” Information collected by these vehicles will then be processed by the company’s Cupertino team and eventually published as part of a software update.

Potentially, this information could be used to create 3D renderings of buildings or to display areas from a Street View perspective similar to that of Google Maps.

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Though adding such features still wouldn’t be enough to truly compete with Google as they continue to integrate more tools into their own platform like AR navigation, it’s a step in the right direction. — AFP-Relaxnews