Google Cloud has hired two prominent industry executives as it looks to win over customers in new verticals such as media and telecommunications.
After a previous stop at Accenture, George Nazi has joined Google Cloud as vice president for telecommunications, media and entertainment industry solutions. Nazi is tasked with setting the vision, mission, and strategy for Google Cloud’s business in the telco, media and entertainment industry vertical. Nazi, who has more than 25 years of experience in the industry, was most recently the senior managing director at Accenture where he led the global communication and media industry segment within Accenture's communication and media technology group.
Before Accenture, Nazi served as executive vice president of Alcatel-Lucent and president of global customer delivery. Prior to Alcatel-Lucent, Nazi was the president of networks and IT infrastructure globally for BT.
Nazi is also working in tandem with Google Cloud’s artificial intelligence and industry solutions teams to develop industry solutions. He is based out of Brussels, Belgium.
“It’s an honor to join Google Cloud, a leader in telco, media, and entertainment that has a strong track record of collaboration with customers and partners such as AT&T, Vodafone, Viacom, Activision Blizzard King, and more," Nazi said, in a prepared statement. "I’m excited for the opportunity to shape our long-term strategy and to empower our customers with Google Cloud’s innovative technologies and solutions.”
RELATED: AT&T and Google Cloud forge 5G edge compute partnership for enterprises
In March, Google Cloud and AT&T announced they were teaming up to build enterprise use cases, which could include video analytics, augmented and virtual reality applications and data-intensive sensors.
The partnership blends AT&T's edge network, including 5G edge computing solutions for enterprises, with Google Cloud's expertise in Kubernetes, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and data analytics, among other technologies. The two companies said they would jointly-develop a portfolio of 5G edge computing solutions that can be delivered on a global scale, both on the edge and in the cloud.
Service providers have thousands of last mile endpoints that the cloud providers—Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google, to name the big three—lack. Partnering with AT&T enables Google Cloud to move its services and applications closer to the edge, and to the end users.
Google Cloud also announced on Monday that it has hired Lori Mitchell-Keller as vice president for industry solutions. Prior to Google Cloud, Mitchell-Keller was employed by SAP for 13 years. Mitchell-Keller started her new job on Monday while Nazi came onboard on May 11.
“As Google Cloud continues to invest in delivering industry solutions for customers, Lori and George bring incredible experience and fill critical senior roles as we help businesses across all industries accelerate their digital transformations," said Google Cloud's Rob Enslin, president for global customer operations, in a statement emailed to FierceTelecom.
After 27 years at SAP, Enslin was hired by Google Cloud in 2019 to work with enterprises. Current CEO Thomas Kurian joined the company in January of last year following a 22-year career at Oracle. Kurian took over the helm at Google Cloud after Diane Green stepped down in 2018 after three years as CEO.
Under Kurian's leadership, Google Cloud has been focused on closing the gap on Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure by branching out into other verticals.
RELATED: Report: Cloud capex bulletproof to COVID-19 in Q1
After the most recent earnings reports of 2020, Amazon still held a hefty lead in the cloud space, according to Synergy Research Group, with a worldwide market share of 32% while Microsoft was second with 18% and Google Cloud third with 8%.
RELATED: In the first quarter, Google Cloud's revenue is up 52% year-over-year
In Alphabet's recent Q1 earnings report last month, Google Cloud, which includes Google Cloud Project (GCP) and G-Suite, generated $2.78 billion in revenue in the first quarter, which marked a 52% increase over the same quarter a year ago. Overall, Alphabet/Google is planning a slight decrease in capex for the remainder of the year.