Apparently Niantic is a company called Evertoon, who created an app that allows people to create animation videos and share them with others.
According to the Evertoon website, “We will be adding a social platform to Niantic’s amazing roster of games, including Pokémon GO, Ingress, and future titles”.
They also mentioned that they will be “contributing engineering leadership experience” which may help them release new features better and avoid the mess that the EX system has caused.
Link to article: https://www.engadget.com/2017/11/03/pokemon-go-buys-social-animation-startup-evertoon/