Google is the undisputed leader of digital maps. Nokia is pretty close with their “Here Maps”, and Apple is slowly and steadily improving “Apple Maps”, but neither of them come close to Google. Looking to keep that edge, several business publications, including the Wall Street Journal, are reporting that Google will spend upwards of $1.3 billion on an Israeli company known as Waze.

Never heard of Waze? It’s probably because you don’t spend too much time driving. Waze is built for people who own a car. Say you’re driving and you spot a slowdown in traffic. You can report that, and now every other Waze user in the area can see your report.

That’s Waze in a nutshell.

Why buy Waze instead of copy their features? Rumor has it that Facebook was interested in buying Waze in an attempt to build out their mapping features. Facebook currently uses Bing Maps to power things like Events, but they were thinking about taking things one step further.

What will Google do with Waze? Probably nothing, just keeping them away from the competition.