Niantic acquires 3D scanning app Scaniverse to expand 'real-world gameboard'

Pokemon Go developer Niantic has acquired 3D scanning mobile app Scaniverse for an undisclosed fee.

The augmented reality studio, which has also worked on titles like Harry Potter: Wizards Unite and Ingress, said the purchase will make multi-OS scanning more accessible to the Niantic Explorer community and help expand its "real-world gameboard."

By making it easier for its community to scan the world around them, Niantic hopes it can hasten its grand ambition of creating a dynamic spatial map of the globe rendered from 3D scanned locations. 

"Working together with our players, we've crowdsourced an image library of some of the most unique and interesting Wayspots around the globe -- from the Gandhi sculpture in San Francisco to the Maneki-Neko shrine in the Gotokuji Temple in Tokyo," wrote the company. 

"The easier it is to scan, the faster it is to build a 3D map of the world. Higher quality scans allow for more fun and engaging experiences Niantic can support as both a publisher and for third-party apps that use our Lightship platform."

Scaniverse will remain a standalone app under the Niantic umbrella, although company founder and CEO Keith Ito will join Niantic's AR engineering team as part of the deal.