A strong jump on the cloud side
Google Cloud revenue rose 103% year over year to $30.7bn in the third quarter, Alphabet said on Wednesday. Analysts had expected $29.57bn, according to Reuters citing LSEG data, so the cloud unit beat forecasts.
Search ads held the group back
Weaker growth in search advertising, however, meant Alphabet as a whole fell short of expectations. In other words, the rapid rise in cloud was not enough on its own to lift the group's overall performance.
Why it matters
Google Cloud is one of the major players in AI infrastructure and enterprise cloud services. Doubling revenue shows the commercial payoff of the company's investments in this area, while the slowdown in advertising revenue highlights the balance within Alphabet's revenue mix.
