From the “I thought that already happened” department, Google revealed this week that it will combine Maps and Waze teams. The move appears to be a cost-cutting measure but could also have some advantages in its synergies and in helping Google’s overall mapping efforts row in the same direction.
To be clear, this is only an integration of teams and management, as the Waze app will live on as a standalone product. Specifically, Waze’s 500 employees will now sit under Google’s Geo organization, which includes Maps, Earth and Street View. Waze CEO Neha Parikh will leave her role, effective Friday.
But the burning question is why these products have been separated to date. Google acquired Waze in 2013 and it managed to stay independently operated until now. Part of that is geographic and cultural as Waze is an Israeli company with immensely valuable talent and IP that Google didn’t want to disrupt.
But it’s a different environment today than it was in 2013. In the post-Covid era of hybrid work – especially in the tech sector – there are systems in place for integrating a team of 500 far-flung employees. Beyond systems, there’s a certain degree of validation and confidence that it will work.
Value Exchange
A more likely reason for keeping Waze independent is product integrity. Before Google acquired the company, it had emerged quickly due to its strong IP, team, and unique UX. There was a sort of altruistic quality to it as well: Share your data to strengthen the product, and benefit in return from others’ data.
This became the ultimate example of the “value exchange” required in the smartphone era when it comes to getting users to opt-in to location sharing. Amidst this success formula, there were countless examples of apps and ad networks that did it wrong, offering little value in exchange for data sharing.
Those days are over of course, due to Apple’s ATT as well as legislation and the rest of the privacy-reform perfect storm that’s gathered over the past half-decade. But Waze sidestepped all of that with a balanced formula for getting users to opt-in to share their location. And Google recognized this.
That’s all to say that keeping Waze separate could have something to do with Google’s recognition of its unique attributes, and the feeling that it should be preserved. Through several acquisitions, Google knows that swallowing companies whole can have disruptive effects on acquiree’s product.
Less is More
Now, moving on to the benefits of integrating Waze, there could be room for better integrations as noted. For example, as I wrote several years ago after the acquisition, Waze’s unique traffic data could be valuable for location-targeted content… though, again, it’s a different privacy environment today.
Much of the above is speculative. The stated reasons appear to be more cost-centric. But count us skeptical, as Google rarely gambles with major assets to cut costs. Then again, we’re in an area of economic retraction and potential disruption that Google hasn’t often faced in its lifetime.
In the end, it could be a combination of these factors. Cost-cutting and streamlined operations can go hand in hand, even for giants like Google. In fact, Sundar Pichai asserted at the Code conference in September that Google has become slower due to overhiring and that changes were coming.
In fact, he hinted that merging teams that work on overlapping products could be one way to solve this systemic issue. Specifically, he said that he hopes to make Google 20 percent more productive by operating “on fewer resources.” Looks like we’re seeing that play out already. We’ll keep watching.
