Tim Cook Apologizes for Apple Maps

This morning Apple issued an official statement on the iOS 6 Maps fiasco as Tim Cook penned a letter to Apple customers. The letter highlights the fact that the company knows their customers expect world-class products when they buy an Apple product, and that they are working very hard to make Maps live up to that incredibly high standard.

Tim Cook’s letter also points out that in order to provide better Maps features such as turn-by-by directions, voice integration, and flyover/vector-based maps the company had to build their own maps solution from the ground up. This statement seems to reinforce the discovery that Google wouldn’t allow Apple to integrate turn-by-turn directions into the iOS with Google Maps.

In an effort to help customers, Cook offered suggestions for various alternatives like Waze, Bing, MapQuest, and Google and Nokia maps via mobile web. It’s clear Apple cares about their customers, especially when the company is going out of their way to promote the competition.

You can read the full letter below.

To our customers,

At Apple, we strive to make world-class products that deliver the best experience possible to our customers. With the launch of our new Maps last week, we fell short on this commitment. We are extremely sorry for the frustration this has caused our customers and we are doing everything we can to make Maps better.

We launched Maps initially with the first version of iOS. As time progressed, we wanted to provide our customers with even better Maps including features such as turn-by-turn directions, voice integration, Flyover and vector-based maps. In order to do this, we had to create a new version of Maps from the ground up.

There are already more than 100 million iOS devices using the new Apple Maps, with more and more joining us every day. In just over a week, iOS users with the new Maps have already searched for nearly half a billion locations. The more our customers use our Maps the better it will get and we greatly appreciate all of the feedback we have received from you.

While we’re improving Maps, you can try alternatives by downloading map apps from the App Store like Bing, MapQuest and Waze, or use Google or Nokia maps by going to their websites and creating an icon on your home screen to their web app.

Everything we do at Apple is aimed at making our products the best in the world. We know that you expect that from us, and we will keep working non-stop until Maps lives up to the same incredibly high standard.

Tim Cook
Apple’s CEO