Two Major Google Departments Will Merge
Yesterday, Google CEO Sundar Pichai made a major announcement that shakes up a lot about the way Google operates now and the potential of its products in the future. Its Devices and Services Product Area (DSPA) team which essentially handles product hardware, will be merging with the Platforms And Ecosystems (P&E) team (which is in charge of Google’s major operating systems) and the Google Research teams that deal with “computational photography and on-device intelligence”, to form a “superteam” simply called Platforms & Devices.
Needless to say, this is a massive change. What this means, in theory, is that the major Google operating systems — Android, ChromeOS, Wear OS, and Android Auto — will now operate under the same roof as major Google products such as Google’s Pixel smartphones, smartwatches, earbuds, and more. This should allow a greater collaboration between the software, hardware, and AI side of things.
Google believes that AI integration can enhance essentially every platform and product that they have, and they also believe it will give the extra perk of speed — faster feature releases and quicker decision-making internally. Rick Osterloh, the former Senior Vice President of DSPA, is going to be in charge of this super team. Hiroshi Lockheimer, the former Senior Vice President of P&E and an essential figure in Google since the birth of Android, will move to other projects in Alphabet.
But How Does This Affect You, As A User Of Google Products?
So, Google is about to undergo some very major restructuring, with two of their most consumer-focused teams smashing together to become one. But how does this affect you, as a consumer, who might be using a Chromebook, an Android phone, or a smartwatch running on Wear OS? Well, let’s try and speculate a bit.
I’ll admit: I think the merger is a good move on paper. It seems that it should allow for a lot more synergy between the people who design the software and the people who make the hardware that it runs on. For instance, Google’s move to the Tensor chip, which they designed themselves, provided a stronger link between Pixel smartphones and their hardware. I believe this will have a similar benefit, with all new software or hardware changes being made with the other half in mind.
Plus, AI chatbots are just one form of AI. Artificial Intelligence can do so much more to improve the performance of our devices, the photos we take, and the convenience of using our devices. This seems to be Google’s aim, whether you’re using Android, Wear OS, or even Android Auto.
