Google Latitude Rejection
So Google was working “closely” with Apple, built a native iPhone application for Latitude, and then Apple essentially rejected it and told them to build a web application.
For Google to think that they were somehow above the rules and could release an app that competes directly the with maps application is naive at best and outright stupid at worst. This is functionality that belongs in Maps.app, not as an add-on. Anyone working “closely” with Apple would have targeted that route.