Niantic, the extremely popular game developer known for their Augmented Reality (AR) game Pokémon Go, has acquired Hoss, which specializes in setting up API systems and other IT solutions, for help with their AR-driven project called Lightship. Lightship Augmented Reality Developer Kit (ARDK) offers real-time AR mapping along with other features and is meant to offer AR experiences for Android and iOS with integration directly within Unity.
Hoss acquired and brought onboard to help Niantic
This project is an extremely interesting endeavor as it would greatly aid in the development of AR games. In a blog post on the official Niantic website, Kei Kawai, the chief product officer at Niantic said- “As we prepare to open the Lightship platform to developers around the world, it’s critically important that we get two things right — both the tools in the ARDK to help developers build new experiences and the developer experience as we work together to build this exciting new world of AR experiences”
The Hoss team also put up a blog post on similar lines.
“Over the last several years we’ve been helping companies deliver a world-class developer experience through our developer portal and API analytics products. Our customers have been able to provide a Stripe-like experience to their customers and gain critical insights into API usage. Companies like Stripe and Plaid have shown that developers are more influential than ever and delighting them can be a powerful competitive advantage.”
-the hoss team
Lightship is currently in Private Beta but it sounds and looks really promising right now. The ARDK is set to get a public launch on November 8 this year. That being said, Niantic does seem to have something big brewing, and Lightship is a very ambitious project as they also acquired Mayhem, the gaming community platform, and Scaniverse, a 3D scanner app earlier this year. All these major acquisitions were made for undisclosed amounts.
What are your thoughts on Niantic having acquired Hoss? Let us know in the comments below!
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