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I am looking for an alternative API to Google places both free and paid to extract location data (lat/long) for business locations i.e all of the "coffee shops in London".
I have looked at Factual, OSM and POIPlaza. They do not fit because of different reasons varying from pricing to completeness of data.
Anything suitable out there?
OpenStreetMaps has an API called nominatim. If you like you can access it via a python library called geopy.
You can pass a POI in the query. Take a look at this list for available POIs: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Nominatim/Special_Phrases/EN
Geocoding API from mapbox Geocoding Mapbox for address or Nominatim
Yes, Geocoding is only about streets. Its question, are complete data in Google Maps? Completeness of data in OSM depends on area of interest.
It is also possible to try Bing REST API. I don't know details.
You can try Sygic Travel API for that. It provides global POI data with emphasis on the places relevant for travellers (such as attractions, coffee bars, restaurants, museums etc.).
