Google Inc will sell the online services of other business software makers in an effort to fill its own product gaps and persuade more companies to rely on applications piped over the Internet.
The online store that was announced late on Tuesday marks another step in Google’s crusade to convert the world to “cloud computing,” the idea of running applications in Web browsers instead of installing them on individual hard drives. The information entered in the programs is also stored in data centers run by third parties such as Google.
More than 50 software makers have agreed to sell their Internet programs through Google, which will keep 20 percent of the sales.
The prices are expected to range from US$50 annually to several hundred dollars annually per user.
Intuit Inc, a maker of business accounting software, and Concur Technologies Inc, a maker of expense reimbursement software, are among the best-known vendors peddling their wares in Google’s store.
All the applications sold in Google’s store can be melded with Google’s own cloud-computing services, said Vic Gundotra, the company’s vice president of engineering.
Google views cloud computing as a way to deepen people’s dependence on its services and generate more revenue beyond the Internet search advertising that provides virtually all its income.
Cloud computing also provides Google with a weapon that could weaken one of its biggest rivals, Microsoft Corp.
The applications store could also could provide fodder for the low-cost computers that will run on a Google operating system named after its Chrome Web browser. The first computers using Chrome OS won’t have a hard drive, meaning they will need Internet access and cloud-computing services to perform the tasks routinely done on Windows-powered machines.
Google has invested billions of dollars during the past five years to keep its systems up and running. Nevertheless, Google’s applications users have occasionally been cut off from their e-mail accounts and other services.
About 25 million people working for more than 2 million businesses, government agencies and schools use Google’s online applications, according to the company.
Google won’t say how many users pay for the service, but the number is growing rapidly. The company’s revenue from software licensing and other non-advertising sources totaled US$762 million last year, more than quadrupling from US$181 million in 2007.
EXPRESSING GRATITUDE: Without its Taiwanese partners which are ‘working around the clock,’ Nvidia could not meet AI demand, CEO Jensen Huang said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and US-based artificial intelligence (AI) chip designer Nvidia Corp have partnered with each other on silicon photonics development, Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said. Speaking with reporters after he met with TSMC chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) in Taipei on Friday, Huang said his company was working with the world’s largest contract chipmaker on silicon photonics, but admitted it was unlikely for the cooperation to yield results any time soon, and both sides would need several years to achieve concrete outcomes. To have a stake in the silicon photonics supply chain, TSMC and
‘DETERRENT’: US national security adviser-designate Mike Waltz said that he wants to speed up deliveries of weapons purchased by Taiwan to deter threats from China US president-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for US secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, affirmed his commitment to peace in the Taiwan Strait during his confirmation hearing in Washington on Tuesday. Hegseth called China “the most comprehensive and serious challenge to US national security” and said that he would aim to limit Beijing’s expansion in the Indo-Pacific region, Voice of America reported. He would also adhere to long-standing policies to prevent miscalculations, Hegseth added. The US Senate Armed Services Committee hearing was the first for a nominee of Trump’s incoming Cabinet, and questions mostly focused on whether he was fit for the
IDENTITY: Compared with other platforms, TikTok’s algorithm pushes a ‘disproportionately high ratio’ of pro-China content, a study has found Young Taiwanese are increasingly consuming Chinese content on TikTok, which is changing their views on identity and making them less resistant toward China, researchers and politicians were cited as saying by foreign media. Asked to suggest the best survival strategy for a small country facing a powerful neighbor, students at National Chia-Yi Girls’ Senior High School said “Taiwan must do everything to avoid provoking China into attacking it,” the Financial Times wrote on Friday. Young Taiwanese between the ages of 20 and 24 in the past were the group who most strongly espoused a Taiwanese identity, but that is no longer
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake and several aftershocks battered southern Taiwan early this morning, causing houses and roads to collapse and leaving dozens injured and 50 people isolated in their village. A total of 26 people were reported injured and sent to hospitals due to the earthquake as of late this morning, according to the latest Ministry of Health and Welfare figures. In Sising Village (西興) of Chiayi County's Dapu Township (大埔), the location of the quake's epicenter, severe damage was seen and roads entering the village were blocked, isolating about 50 villagers. Another eight people who were originally trapped inside buildings in Tainan
RSS