Google justifies its massive AI spending with a booming cloud business; plus, OpenAI makes ChatGPT Health available to all US users
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Alphabet investors have very publicly worried that the company's massive AI spending is not worth the money.
How did Google justify its massive AI spending in the latest earnings report?
With the company's latest earnings report, those investors should be able to relax a little bit. The takeaway, Google's cloud business, driven largely by enterprise AI adoption, is booming. The search giant saw Google Cloud revenue spike 82% from where it was this time last year, climbing to nearly $25 billion. That's well above last quarter's generous year-over-year growth, which showed a revenue jump of 63% to $20 billion. And it handily beats what Wall Street analysts expected for this quarter's growth. The expectation was $22.46 billion.
What drove Google Cloud's 82% revenue surge and record profits?
Those cloud gains were driven largely by enterprise AI solutions and enterprise AI infrastructure adoption, the company said, while also noting that its backlog of cloud contracting work, that is, work that it hasn't yet converted into revenue, has climbed to $514 billion. The company's profit hit $112.1 billion, which is a massive jump from this time last year when the company reported $28.1 billion in profit, the company's earning report showed. Meanwhile, Alphabet's overall revenue grew 24% year-over-year during the past quarter to nearly $120 billion. The company also saw Google services revenue jump 15% to $94.5 billion. Google CEO Sundar Pichai said during Wednesday's earnings call, Our AI investments are redefining what is possible across every part of our business.
We have exciting momentum across the board. More people are also adopting Gemini, Google's AI chatbot, as the app currently enjoys 950 million monthly active users. In Q4 of 2025, Google reported that the app had 750 million users. It's worth noting that spiking revenue is not unusual for Google. This marks the company's 12th consecutive quarter of double-digit revenue growth. But even by that standard, this quarter represents a particularly bountiful period for the tech giant.
How is Google connecting AI investments, data centers, and long-term demand?
Alphabet's spending is still hefty with its capital expenditures, you know, the money it spends building data centers and buying chips and expanding its infrastructure, estimated to be between $180 billion and $190 billion for the year, a fact not lost on analysts during Wednesday's earnings call. Several pressed Pichai on when and how much those investments will pay off.
What is ChatGPT Health and which US users can access it?
He said, I think our compute capacity investments in 2027, you know, we're seeing strong demand indicators, including long term deals. I think, if anything, the dynamics look healthier than where we were about a year ago. So that's what gives us the confidence to undertake those investments. On Thursday, OpenAI said it is making ChatGPT Health, a feature that helps users with health-related queries, available to all US-based users over 18 across all plans.
How does OpenAI handle health data integration, safety, and legal concerns?
The announcement comes a day after a Florida-based pastor sued the company for giving a near-fatal suggestion not to consult a doctor. The company started testing the feature through a dedicated hub earlier in January, allowing users to integrate data from other services and their personal information from services such as Apple Health, Function, and MyFitnessPal. At that time, OpenAI said users were asking 230 million health-related queries each week. That number has now gone up to 300 million. Users can also integrate their medical records from hospital systems like Epic and Oracle Health and health platforms like OneMedical and FunctionHealth. OpenAI said earlier that users needed to use the health hub for health-related queries.
Now they can choose to draw insights from connected information in the health section in all queries. The company said during the testing it observed that 70% of health-related queries took place outside the dedicated hub. Through this new feature, users can use their health information to get information on food or allergies in the general chat.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:02–0:50
2
How did Google justify its massive AI spending in the latest earnings report?
0:50–1:33
3
What drove Google Cloud's 82% revenue surge and record profits?
1:33–3:09
4
How is Google connecting AI investments, data centers, and long-term demand?
3:09–3:34
5
What is ChatGPT Health and which US users can access it?
3:34–4:09
6
How does OpenAI handle health data integration, safety, and legal concerns?
4:09–6:52
Speakers
2 identifiedMore from TechCrunch Industry News
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