The Map Business

The other day I wrote about what it likes to build Google Maps and this week I read that Foursquare has switched off Google's map service (apparently they're starting to charge businesses who use it). It's interesting to think that just a few years ago there was no such thing as a map API service business and now Foursquare is writing this:

When we initially began looking around for other map providers, we found some incredibly strong alternatives. And while the new Google Maps API pricing was the reason we initially started looking into other solutions, we ultimately ended up switching because, after all our research and testing, OpenStreetMap and MapBox was simply the best fit for us.