Alphabet Inc., the parent company of Google, shared its financial results for the first quarter of 2024 today.
While Google celebrated significant growth in crucial revenue sectors, CEO Sundar Pichai referred to the focus on its AI advancements as the "Gemini era."
Here are the figures: Q1 revenues amounted to $80.5 billion, marking a 15% increase year-over-year, surpassing Wall Street's expectations. Net income reached $23.7 billion, with diluted earnings per share at $1.89. Operating margins saw growth to 32%, up from 25% in the previous year.
Ruth Porat, Alphabet’s President and CFO, highlighted:
"Our strong financial results reflect revenue strength across the company and ongoing efforts to durably reengineer our cost base."
Driving growth were Google's core advertising units, including Search and YouTube, contributing to advertising revenues of $61.7 billion. The Cloud division also flourished, generating $9.6 billion in revenues, up by 28% year-over-year. Pichai anticipated YouTube and Cloud jointly reaching a $100 billion annual revenue run rate by the end of 2024.
Regarding the integration of generative AI into Search, Pichai stated:
"We are being measured in how we do this, focusing on areas where gen AI can improve the Search experience, while also prioritizing traffic to websites and merchants."
He also mentioned that Google's generative AI features have already answered over a billion queries, enabling users to access new information and ask more complex questions.
Google highlighted increased Search usage and user satisfaction with the new AI overview results, along with the "Circle to Search" feature on Android, offering instant AI-powered answers via Google Lens.
As part of the AI roadmap, Alphabet is consolidating all teams building AI models under the Google DeepMind umbrella. Pichai mentioned significant cost reductions, with machine costs associated with generative AI search results decreasing by 80% over the past year.
Discussing monetization opportunities, Alphabet sees potential through its advertising products, Cloud services, and subscription offerings. Google is integrating Gemini into ad products like Performance Max and extending Google AI capabilities to enterprise clients through the Cloud division. Google One surpassed 100 million paid subscribers in Q1 and introduced a new premium plan featuring advanced generative AI capabilities powered by Gemini models.
Pichai outlined six key advantages positioning Alphabet to lead the "next wave of AI innovation," including research leadership, robust infrastructure, global reach, streamlined teams, and multiple revenue streams.
With events like Google I/O and Google Marketing Live on the horizon, further updates on AI initiatives and the product roadmap are anticipated.