The obvious question raised by Google’s reorganization as Alphabet is whether Larry Page and Sergey Brin will decide to break out Google Cloud Platform into a separate business from Google, the search engine-focused subsidiary headed by CEO Sundar Pichai. Breaking out Google Cloud Platform (GCP) into a separate entity not only paves the way for more significant, dedicated investments dedicated to cloud computing on the part of Google, but also provides a means for investors to more accurately gauge the success of the Google Cloud Platform as measured by its financials and the growth of the entity more generally. The tricky part about breaking out Google Cloud Platform as a separate entity involves the depth of its inter-relationship with all of Google’s other businesses, and particularly Google Search, Google Maps, YouTube and Android. While assessing revenue generation from third party customers of the Google Cloud Platform is easy, the more challenging task involves quantifying the operational overhead of GCP, particularly given that it powers all of Google’s infrastructure already.
Cloud Computing Today 