They do invest in improving the project https://github.com/osmlab/appledata/

My first instinct is that it's a money thing -- kind of like how Yelp results show up in DDG now which I only recently noticed. DDG is taking a page out of Mozilla's book and getting as many corporate partnerships as they can.

Same here, hopefully it's not a pre-acquirement move and instead be more aligned in the future like you said.