Another Expensive Google Moonshot Project is beginning to fade into the Sunset
Google's big moonshot projects generate a lot of interest from the press and that's why they create them. Vaporware has always sucked in the press who need to write about cool dreamy things that don't come to market. Google Glass disappeared; Project Ara – the modular phoned died; Project Tango promoting a 3D camera with an Augmented Reality twist was adopted by Lenovo recently but wasn't adopted by Google's own Pixel smartphone. What does that say? Well, it shows no confidence in their own project. Today another project is on the ropes and likely to die in its current form: Google Fiber
USA Today reports that "Google Fiber is halting its rollout in 10 cities and laying off staff as its chief executive Craig Barratt steps down, dealing a major setback to the Internet giant's ambitions of blanketing the nation in super-speedy Internet.
Google Fiber is part of Alphabet's Access division created in the corporate restructuring of Google as Alphabet.
On recent earnings calls with analysts, Ruth Porat, chief financial officer of Google and Alphabet, defended the investment in Google Fiber, which is the most expensive division inside Alphabet apart from Google itself.
"Alphabet seems to have been rethinking lots of its non-core activities and either focusing them more narrowly, divesting them, or making other changes. It feels like this is the latest shoe to drop," said Jan Dawson, chief analyst with Jackdaw Research. "Although Google is framing this as a pause while it considers next generation technologies, I would hope that it's actually a concession on the company's part that being in the access business is a distraction rather than a strategic imperative." For more on this, read the full USA Today report here.
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