Google Cloud brings in $4B in Q1, up 46 percent
Google Cloud brought in $4.047 billion in sales for the first quarter of 2021, Google's parent company Alphabet reported Tuesday. That's up 46 percent from $2.78 billion the year prior.
"We're very pleased with the ongoing momentum in Google Cloud, with revenues of $4.0 billion in the quarter reflecting strength and opportunity in both GCP and Workspace," Google and Alphabet CFO Ruth Porat said in a statement.
The cloud business posted an operating loss of $974 million, compared with a loss of $1.73 billion a year prior.
Google recently began disclosing Google Cloud's operating losses, giving a better picture of how much Google's ad business continues to subsidize its cloud expansion.
While Cloud's growing scale should help improve its operating results, Porat said on a conference call Tuesday that Google continues to "invest to build the cloud organization for long-term performance."
"Our approach to building the business has not changed," Porat said with respect to Cloud. "We remain focused on revenue growth, and we will continue to invest aggressively in products and our go-to-market organizations, given the opportunity we see."
Porat also said that Google Cloud Platform (GCP)'s revenue growth was once again "meaningfully above cloud overall." Workspace revenue, she said, was driven by growth in both seats and average revenue per seat.
Overall, Alphabet in Q1 reported net income of $17.93 billion and diluted earnings per share of $26.29. Total revenues came to $55.3 billion, up 34 percent.
Wall Street was looking for earnings of $15.88 per share with $51.68 billion in revenue.
As usual, Google Services revenues attributed most of Q1 sales, with $51.18 billion in revenue, and advertising continues to generate the most revenue for Google. In Q1, Google ad revenues came to $44.68 billion, compared to $33.76 billion in Q1 2020.
Google Search and other ad revenue (excluding YouTube) increased year-over-year to $31.88 billion in Q1. Revenue for YouTube ads rose from $4.04 billion in Q1 2020 to $6 billion in Q1 2021.
In Alphabet's moonshot "Other bets" category, revenue came to $1968 million while its operating loss reached $1.15 billion.
"Over the last year, people have turned to Google Search and many online services to stay informed, connected and entertained," Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said in a statement. "We've continued our focus on delivering trusted services to help people around the world. Our Cloud services are helping businesses, big and small, accelerate their digital transformations."
Alphabet also reported that on April 23, its board of directors authorized the company to repurchase up to an additional $50 billion of its Class C capital stock.