Google is planning to disrupt Microsoft and IBM's market. Here’s how

India is going to turn into a battleground as Google will go against Microsoft and IBM as it marching towards enterprise business.

Google has been taking a gander at getting corporates to utilize Gmail, Google Drive, Google Docs, Hangouts and its cloud stage. What's more, the push on Google-Apps-For-Work, rebranded as G-Suite a week ago, has been especially solid in India.

For one thing, top officials from G-Suite have been coming to India each third month to meet potential corporate clients. To bait undertaking clients bolted into contracts with contenders like Microsoft and IBM, Google is sweetening the arrangement by offering free administration till the current contract closes. Google had sounded its aim to pursue the enterprise business in India when it cut costs about down the middle to drive selection in 2013.

"We do see that overall in India, Google is doing pretty well, actually better than in other areas. If you look at the worldwide market, it is competitive though Microsoft is doing better. It is a viable competitor in most markets but definitely in India,” Jeffrey Mann, research vice president at technology research firm Gartner, told ET.

Mann said Google had become more focused on the enterprise business since it brought in former VMware founder Diane Greene to run its cloud business last November. Even in India, experts say the company is hiring from enterprise technology vendors and is building a base of partners.

"India is one of our fastest growing markets. I can't give you number, but yes, we are growing our sales force here,” Mohit Pande, country manager, India and South East Asia, for Google for Work, told ET.

An industry examiner with learning of the employing plans for the undertaking business said that the organization is employing sales officials both at the mid-level and at the senior level. They are simply developing the group. Since they have declared in-nation server farms, they have a superior offering to take to corporate.

But even with the arrival of data centres in the country in 2017 and an enterprise sales team, corporate chief information officers say Google will have to do a lot more to win their business.

"I know some companies that are exploring that. But I would not be very comfortable because you need a different DNA to serve corporates, you need customer support and integration teams. Simply a data centre here is not enough,” a chief information officer with a financial services company told ET.

The corporate DNA is something set up players like Microsoft and IBM are highlighting in their pitch to clients. “We have financial-backed service level agreements. If you are not able to send an email, we know that is a problem for your business. We give customers that comfort along with innovation and flexibility. Office 365 had been growing in the 'healthy double digit range' for the past few years and had even been attracting customers who used other platforms,” Alok Lall, director of Microsoft India'Office division, told ET.

Experts say the aggressive scene will probably move one year from now, as they anticipate that Apple will enter the brawl.

"With Apple and IBM both investing aggressively in productivity and storage (take Apple iCloud and IBM Verse), 2017 will see competition in this space intensify between Google, Microsoft, Apple and IBM,, Anshoo Nandwani, Principal Analyst at Greyhound Research, told ET.
(image: Reuters)