San Francisco, NFAPost: Revealing the stupendous growth of Google Play, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said 150 million people across 40 countries are using Google Pay.
Google head’s statement at the investor call as part of the March quarter assumes significance as there is a spurt in digitalisation happening world over and financial transaction are disrupted because of this shift.
“150 million people across 40 countries are using Google Pay…And then over time, we will innovate and build new digital experiences. Simple examples you saw was we rolled out the ability for users to pay for parking on Google Pay with their voice just using Google Assistant,” said Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai.
He also dwelled on the evolution of Google Pay and its ambitions to add more utility to the service.
Sundar Pichai also made it clear that Google will remain focused on accelerating growth in India’s digital ecosystem and expanding partnerships in the region.
Pichai mentioned hybrid workplace models will stay. “Even as more people return to in-person activities, we are seeing hybrid approaches to learning and working are here to stay, and our products are helping partners seize these new opportunities,” he said.
To support its flexible work plans this year, Pichai said, Google is planning to invest about $9.5 billion in its US offices and data centres, creating at least 12,000 new Google jobs in the US in places like New York and Atlanta.
Talking about the service fee for apps on Google Play that had become controversial, Pichai said 99% of app developers qualify for a service fee of 15% or less.
“While this impacted our short-term results, we think it’s the right long-term approach to support the ecosystem and to be the most developer-friendly app store and gaming platform available. We are also exploring alternative billing options. And as we do this, we’ll continue to uphold high safety standards that protect personal data and sensitive financial information,” said Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai.
In order to enable long-term growth, the company is investing in areas like cloud, AI, YouTube, and Search. The board of Alphabet has authorised $70 billion in share repurchases, significantly up from last year’s $50 billion.
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