Naver Labs Corp., R&D subsidiary of South Korea’s leading online portal operator Naver Corp. has teamed up with U.S.-based mobile application developer Foursquare Labs Inc. to jointly develop a point of interest search engine.

Naver Labs said on Wednesday it has signed a memorandum of understanding with Foursquare Labs to cooperate on developing a new search engine for point of interest. A point of interest, or POI, refers to a specific point location that someone may find useful or interesting like restaurants, cafes, clubs and parks.

Foursquare Labs provides mobile applications that enable users to find places to eat, drink, shop or visit in any city in the world. Its flagship app Foursquare City Guide recommends various places to suit tastes of users. Naver Labs plans to use the company’s various search data to develop its own POI search engine and then to further progress with a new business model using the developed search engine.

“Foursquare’s data will greatly help us develop an accurate search engine, and we could create great synergy for further research and development,” said an official at Naver Labs.

Before the latest contract, Naver Labs partnered with global mapping and location data service provider HERE Technologies last month to develop an indoor mapping system that creates 3D indoor map and automatically updates latest changes in the area detected using artificial intelligence technologies. Demand for the digital mapping technology is soaring these days as it is used for various online businesses.

By Lee Sun-hee and Lee Ha-yeon

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