Amazon taps Nokia for Kindle Fire maps, report says
The company will use Nokia's service to deliver full built-in mapping with the Kindle Fire.
Nokia has a new mapping partner in Amazon, a new report claims.
The companies recently inked a deal that will see Nokia power the built-in mapping services in the Amazon Kindle Fire 2, Reuters is reporting today, citing sources. The move is seen as a snub to Google, which powers the Android platform likely to be running on the next Kindle Fire. Google's mapping service comes built-in with Android.
The Google snub, if true, is the second the search giant has faced this year. Apple announced at the Worldwide Developers Conference in June that it was removing Google Maps as its operating system's built-in mapping application, and replacing it with its own Maps service. Google Maps had previously been available in the first five versions of iOS.
Nokia Maps has been growing quite rapidly lately, thanks to help from Microsoft. The company's services will power the mapping in Windows Phone 8, and also offers live traffic and geocoding to Bing.
Earlier this year, Nokia touted its standing in the mapping space, saying that it's one of the biggest companies in that market, thanks to its services powering in-car, Web, and mobile mapping services. Nokia, for example, powers Yahoo mapping services.
Amazon plans to hold a special press event next week where it's expected to announce the new Kindle Fire. As expected, CNET will be on-hand to cover every last minute of that event.
CNET has contacted Amazon for comment on the Reuters report. We will update this story when we have more information.