Google has announced to shut down its cloud computing product for China. The project was internally called Isolated Region. It aimed to particularly cater to countries that want to control the flow of data within their national borders.
It would separate the particular product from the company’s central cloud computing systems and network infrastructure. Moreover, it allowed third-party companies and governments to oversee data moving through without fear.
However, it is still not clear if the project was intended to be a G Suite equivalent or a different combination of storage and cloud hosting. The Google cloud project for China, Isolated Region aimed to expand the company’s cloud computing services in nations where the governments usually require a government-controlled entity as a business partner.
Shutting the Cloud Project: Geo-political tensions or Alternative Approach
Google cloud computing project in China was temporarily halted in January last year. As per an Al Jazeera report, two Google employees working on the project cited geopolitical tensions between the US and China as the major reason for the pause. The two added, pandemic further escalated the issues which led to subsequent closure of the project.
However, the leading news organisation later added that another spokesperson from Google reached out after the initial publication. She clarified that the project wasn’t scrapped due to the pandemic or the geopolitical tensions.
She reportedly added that the firm isn’t weighing options to offer the Google Cloud Platform in China and the Isolated Region project was abandoned because other approaches being actively pursued by the firm was offering better outcomes.
Notably, ‘Isolated Region’ was the second high profile project in the Asian state from the Alphabet firm. It had earlier launched a project called ‘Dragonfly’ in the country in 2018. However, it reportedly scrapped the project in December 2019.
Furthermore, amidst the concerns around data privacy and security, the tech giant had already announced not to offer Google Services to Huawei smartphones. ‘Isolated Region’ was part of the company’s efforts to expand its revenue sources beyond search engine advertisement and further venture into the promising market of cloud services
