I think Apple gets their road map data from TomTom <http://www.tomtom.com/en_us/> and a lot of other sources including Waze from the following credits URL <http://gspa21.ls.apple.com/html/attribution.html>.
However, Apple does not appear to actually send out specially equipped cars to gather road data, like Google does.
My understanding of the political situation for Apple Maps was that Google refused to provide turn-by-turn directions for the iPhone app, and would not give anyone else API to their map data from the iPhone so that a 3rd party could provide the service. As a result Android phones had better "Free" turn-by-turn maps, and iPhone just had static maps. This was a serious competitive disadvantage, so Apple responded by building its own Maps app with turn-by-turn directions using data from 3rd parties. Shortly after Apple released their Maps and Google found a huge drop-off in the use of their maps (along with the valuable user they could sell to advertisers), Google revised their iPhone maps app to include turn-by-turn directions. And since Apple maps on the iPhone is the default map app, Google had to do things to make their app enough better to get people to a) download it, b) continue to use it so that they could again get all the valuable user data to sell to their advertisers. In other words Apple maps forced Google to get better. Apple is a hardware company, and if Google maps sell iPhones, Apple is happy.
As for acquiring Waze, it is too late, as Google acquired Waze awhile ago.
I use Waze locally for traffic conditions, and Google Maps when on vacation because it tells me what lane I should be in for the next turn when there are multiple exit lanes.
