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Indian government sector next big thing for Google Cloud

New Delhi, July 29 

Google that last week disclosed its Cloud business has hit an annual revenue run rate of over $8 billion - quite a worrisome news for its rivals - is now mobilising its efforts to tap into the burgeoning Cloud opportunities in the government sector in India.

The aim is clear: To help government clients have scalable, agile and secure multi-Cloud experience with built-in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) capabilities.

According to Nitin Bawankule, Director, Google Cloud, India, the time is ripe for the company to now deeply explore the government sector as various state governments are moving fast on initiatives like building smart cities, along with plans to move their workloads to a secure on-premise as well as Public Cloud atmosphere.

"We are working closely with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) to achieve the full Cloud Service Provider (CSP) empanelment. The idea is to help state governments have a secure experience with Cloud, along with utilising New-Age AI/ML capabilities," Bawankule told media during an interaction.

According to a latest Nasscom report, growing adoption of Big Data analytics, AI/ML and Internet of Things (IoT) is likely to push Cloud market in India to reach $7.1 billion by 2022.

"We are still scratching the surface as opportunities are huge in the Indian market. Google Cloud will soon have dedicated sales teams working on the government vertical in the country," said the executive who is an IIM Bangalore alumnus with over 20 years of experience in various leadership roles.

The Google Cloud Platform (GCP) region went live in India last year. The Cloud region in Mumbai -- that uses Google's core infrastructure, data analytics and AI/ML-- offers several services, including compute, Big Data, storage and networking.

"We are working on to give Google Cloud an image of a differentiator in the Indian market. The concept of 'One Google' with all solutions under one roof is what we are going to take to the potential customers," Bawankule noted.

Under the leadership of global industry veteran Thomas Kurian, said Bawankule, Google Cloud is bullish on big Indian enterprises, SMBs, unicorns and startups.

Under Kurian, Google Cloud is on an acquisition spree and has just bought Elastifile, a provider of scalable enterprise storage for the Cloud. Google has also announced to acquire data analytics company Looker for $2.6 billion.

"We have ramped up efforts in the last 12-18 months to make our presence felt across the industry verticals. The Indian government sector is the next big thing and we will have more to share on that front soon," said Bawankule.