Google Is Combining Its Maps and Waze Teams Amid Cost-Cutting Pressure

Google’s father or mother firm, Alphabet Inc., introduced it’s performing some restructuring to merge Google Maps and Waze workers amid pressures to streamline the enterprise and minimize prices. The firm has mentioned each mapping apps will proceed to function independently.

The merge will take impact on Friday, December 9, and whereas Google has mentioned it doesn’t have plans for layoffs, the transfer is anticipated to shift Waze’s 500 workers to Google’s Geo group, which manages Google Maps, Google Earth, and Street View.

“Google remains deeply committed to Waze’s unique brand, its beloved app, and its thriving community of volunteers and users,” Waze’s head of PR, Caroline Bourdeau, instructed The Verge.

She added, “By bringing the Waze team into Geo’s portfolio of real-world mapping products, like Google Maps, Google Earth, and Street View, the teams will benefit from further increased technical collaboration.”

Following the restructuring, Waze CEO Neha Parikh is anticipated to step by step go away the corporate, an organization spokesperson instructed The Wall Street Journal. Parikh beforehand labored because the president of Hotwire, Inc. and joined Waze as CEO in June 2021.

Alphabet, Inc. acquired Waze in 2013 for simply over $1 billion, turning into the corporate’s fourth-largest deal on the time, in keeping with the Silicon Business Journal. Waze boasts an estimated 150 million month-to-month customers who actively make the most of the mapping service and has labored to construct up its promoting lately.

Waze continues to function independently from Google Maps and can proceed to take action, in keeping with Alphabet, Inc. After buying Waze, Google did built-in among the fashionable options into its personal mapping service. The options embrace reporting close by fuel costs, pace traps, visitors slowdown alerts, and including stops alongside your route.

Google’s announcement to merge Google and Waze workers comes as Google CEO Sundar Pichai has slowed the corporate’s enlargement due partially to reducing development in promoting this yr.

The firm reported a income of almost $69.1 billion within the third quarter this yr, up 6% from 2021. Its promoting income additionally grew by solely 2.5% in comparison with final yr’s development of 41%. In September, Pichai mentioned he hoped to make Google 20% extra productive and mentioned he was contemplating merging groups to work on overlapping merchandise.

In a statement accompanying the expansion outcomes, Pichai mentioned, “We’re sharpening our focus on a clear set of product and business priorities. We are focused on both investing responsibly for the long term and being responsive to the economic environment.”