According to Sundar Pichai, the Google One cloud storage service boasts an impressive subscriber base of nearly 100 million

According to Google CEO Sudar Pichai, the number of subscribers for the company’s Google One cloud storage service is on the verge of reaching 100 million.

During Alphabet’s Q4 2023 earnings call, Pichai mentioned the company’s plans to incorporate additional AI-powered functionalities into the Google One service. The search engine giant initially unveiled Google One in 2018. The product has undergone significant development since then, now offering additional benefits. These include Google Photos editing features like magic eraser, portrait light and portrait blur, color pop, and sky suggestion.

Google One Plans are available for as low as $1.99 per month. This plan provides 100GB of storage that can be shared with up to five individuals, along with access to its VPN service within the United States.

Pichai highlighted that Google’s subscription business, which includes YouTube Premium and Music, YouTube TV, and Google One, is experiencing significant growth and has surpassed $15 billion in annual revenues. The company reported a significant increase, five times higher than the previous year. The report noted that the “Subscriptions, Platforms and Devices” vertical experienced a significant 23% growth year-on-year, thanks to its strong subscription performance.

In November 2022, Google reported that YouTube’s paid plans had reached 80 million subscribers. However, no further updates have been provided since that time. According to the company, YouTube Shorts receive a significant viewership, with 2 billion signed-in users watching them monthly and generating 7 billion daily plays. These numbers align with the figures reported in Google’s Q3 2023 results.

In recent weeks, Google made the decision to reduce its workforce, resulting in the layoff of approximately 1,000 employees across various divisions, such as hardware, engineering, services, and YouTube. Pichai later communicated with the staff through an internal memo, informing them of upcoming job cuts for the year.

In its earnings release, Google stated that it had 182,502 employees, a slight increase compared to the previous quarter’s figure of 182,381 employees. Nevertheless, the figure represents a significant decline from the 190,234 employees the company reported in late 2022.

Google’s ad revenue of $65.5 billion did not meet analyst expectations of $65.8 billion, despite experiencing an 11% year-on-year increase. The company’s stocks dipped by 4% because of this miss.