Google Now is a predictive search app that utilizes the vast amounts of data that Google collects on its users to determine what they want before they even want it. While Google’s own arsenal of information is already one of the largest out there, the company has decided to partner up with a bunch of other companies like Airbnb and Lyft to utilize data collected by third-party apps as well.
Google Inc. doesn’t want to lose its perch atop the search market, and it’s looking to the likes of Airbnb, eBay, Lyft and a couple dozen other companies to help it do just that. On Friday, Google is set to announce that, for the first time, it’s allowing third-party apps to deliver information to Google Now, its predictive search app that’s built into Android phones, Android Wear smartwatches and the Chrome web browser. Google Now has been seen as the future of Google’s search technology since it launched in 2012—a tool built to deliver frequently searched for information before users ask for it: Traffic for the commute home, sports scores, details on flights and reservations, package shipments, calendar appointments, breaking or popular news stories, and the weather. Until today, all of this data came directly from a user’s Google account—what they searched for on Google.com and bits of relevant data scraped from their Gmail accounts.