Google Has Big Plans for Google Voice, Cloud Computing in 2010
Google's Bradley Horowitz, vice president of product management at Google, said Google Voice and cloud computing will be huge plays for the search engine giant in 2010. Expect the Gizmo5 assets to bolster the Google Voice phone management application.
Context & Ripple Effects
Google Voice had already been framed as an expansive communications effort, while telecom providers were reported to be pursuing its calling features. A December report also raised the prospect of bringing Voice into Google's enterprise lineup, making a 2010 product push relevant beyond consumer phone management.
Google's stated plan to use Gizmo5 assets to strengthen Voice pairs that communications effort with a broader cloud-computing priority. The same story's pickup by The Next Web shows the VoIP angle was central to how the announcement travelled.
First-order effects
- Google Voice becomes a named 2010 priority for Google, with Gizmo5 assets slated to improve the application's phone-management capabilities.
- Google's cloud-computing push elevates cloud services alongside Voice in its stated product agenda.
Second-order effects
- Telecom providers already chasing Google Voice-style calling features face greater pressure to differentiate their own communications offerings as Google invests further in Voice.
- A potential enterprise role for Voice gives Google a reason to connect communications features more closely to its cloud-service strategy, rather than position Voice solely as a consumer utility.
Third-order effects
- If Google carries Voice into enterprise services, communications features and cloud delivery may become a more integrated competitive layer for vendors serving business users.
- The move points toward cloud platforms competing through adjacent applications such as communications, not only through underlying computing capacity.
The trend: Google is positioning cloud computing as strategic leverage while using communications software to broaden the services attached to its platform.