Google is known for “just” throw a new service on the market. That’s their corporate culture. It promotes creativity within the company and ensures innovation. But at the end of the day also Google must be clean up the playground. This resulted in numerous closures of famous and lesser-known services in the recent past. Latest victim is the popular Google Reader. It will be shut down at 1th of July 2013. This naturally raises the question of how vulnerable Google’s cloud services are for a portfolio adjustment. At least the finger on the close button seems to fit very loosely.
Longevity vs. popularity
Google scrubs its Google Reader as its popularity has fallen sharply in the past, Google said. That Google is apparently not quite right here, shows a recent petition against its closure. After all, 20,000+ subscribed against its closing.
Google sometimes gives me the impression that it is like a big kid. They find many things at once exciting (20 percent rule), play with it, investing time and then loses interest and pleasure, when the playmates apparently no longer want to play with it. The concentration phase is only with a few products really high. (From a entrepreneurial point of view correct.)
Companies do not like that
Google is currently making great efforts to broadly make it in the business environment. Regarding current providers such as Microsoft and IBM no easy task. Google’s trump card is that they are born in the cloud and know the rules inside out. Finally, they almost self-developed them.
Nevertheless, the question is permissible. Why should a business use Google cloud services, such as Google Apps or the Google Cloud Platform, if services that are apparently not used sufficiently well, to be suddenly closed? Even if Google has monetized above named cloud solutions now, this question retains its place. Because by the monetization of individual service suddenly gets a new KPI, the revenue!
Google may assume that enterprises will not be thrilled if they suddenly get an e-mail that the service they are using will be closed due to lower attractiveness and revenue figures in three months.
For enterprises, this type of product management is not attractive and Google must learn that enterprises need to be treated differently from private users. Even if the consumerization progresses.
Clean up the portfolio is good, but…
No question, it makes sense to clean up the portfolio steadily. It is also recommended for many other providers. However, these seem to act in the interests of their customers and offer their products and services on a long-term roadmap. However, it seems that the finger at the “service close button” at Google sits relatively loose.
I do not think companies will come together for a petition against the closure of Google services. Indeed, you always hear about “too big to fail”, but Google is not as big as all that.
