Google CEO warns of more layoffs
Google laid off around 12,000 people this time last year, about six percent of its workforce, in the face of inflation and rising interest rates.
Google laid off around 12,000 people this time last year, about six percent of its workforce, in the face of inflation and rising interest rates.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai said this year's layoffs were aimed at “removing layers to simplify execution and drive velocity in some areas.” This comes as the company recalibrates priorities to fit investment into artificial intelligence (AI) technology.
Under DMA, companies with more than 45 million monthly active users and a 75-billion-euros ($82 billion) market capitalisation are considered gatekeepers, and labelled as such, they are required for example to make their messaging apps interoperate with rivals and let users decide which apps to pre-install on their devices.
"We are inviting businesses and experts to tell us about any competition issues that they may perceive in these industries, whilst also closely monitoring AI partnerships to ensure they do not unduly distort market dynamics," she said.
Pichai was in court in San Francisco to defend Alphabet's Google from a lawsuit by Epic Games that alleges its app store policies amount to an illegal monopoly and have caused consumers to pay artificially high prices.
Epic Games, the maker of the popular video game Fortnite, is trying to convince the jury that a Google Play payment processing system that collects a 15% to 30% commission from in-app purchases is illegally hurting consumers and software developers. Google collects those commissions, according to Epic, by using its market muscle to thwart competing Android app stores - a strategy that drives up prices and discourages innovation.
Born in India, Pichai joined joined Google in 2004 from the consulting firm McKinsey & Co. Before becoming CEO, he helped develop Google Chrome, the world's most popular web browser, and was named to the company's top job in 2015. He is also CEO of Google's parent company, Alphabet. Under his leadership, the company's net income ballooned to $60 billion last year from $19.5 billion in 2016, the first full year of Alphabet's operation.
The double-digit increase in revenue comes after four quarters of single-digit expansion. Google faced a slowdown in ad revenue, which is core to its business model owing to tough macroeconomic conditions and increased competition from short form video and social media app TikTok.
It said, "Prime Minister acknowledged Google's 100 languages initiative and encouraged efforts to make AI tools available in Indian languages. He also encouraged Google to work on AI tools for good governance."
Emails Pichai wrote in 2007 to Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, among other executives, were introduced as evidence in the Justice Department’s antitrust case against Alphabet Inc.’s Google, which is underway in Washington. The emails, written when Pichai was in charge of Google’s Chrome browser, show concerns about the company’s agreement to pay Apple in exchange for being the pre-selected search option on the Safari browser.
In a boost for the government’s Make in India programme, Alphabet Inc’s Google announced partnership with PC maker HP to manufacture the tech giant’s Chromebook laptops in India from October 2.