Google to Triple Its Canadian Workforce--Update
06 Febrero 2020 - 04:07PM
Noticias Dow Jones
By Vipal Monga
Google is planning to more than triple its Canadian workforce
over three years, as the technology giant steps up hiring at its
Stadia gaming studio as well as for cloud computing and artificial
intelligence projects.
The Alphabet Inc. unit, which currently employs 1,500 people in
the country, said Thursday it will expand offices in Montreal,
Toronto and Waterloo, Ontario. The moves would increase its staff
in Canada to 5,000 people by the end of 2022.
"There's a lot of momentum in Canada," said finance chief Ruth
Porat in an interview at Google's Toronto office. She said the
company has been expanding its workforce outside of the San
Francisco Bay Area faster than near its home base.
Google had nearly 119,000 workers world-wide as of Dec. 31,
having boosted its head count by 20% from a year earlier. Ms. Porat
has said adding staff to Google's Cloud business was the biggest
driver of employment growth companywide, and that total employment
is likely to grow at a faster rate in 2020.
The company said it would open a new office in Waterloo, just
outside of Toronto. It will accommodate as many as 3,000 employees,
who will work on global initiatives such as selling cloud-computing
services to clients in health care, aiming to store data and
develop software for hospitals. Google has about 1,000 employees in
its existing Waterloo office.
Ms. Porat said Thursday that Google sees opportunities in
merging knowledge from the cloud health-care group with the
artificial intelligence team in Toronto, where the number of
employees could jump to 1,000 from 400. Toronto is the center for a
Google Brain artificial intelligence research program headed by
University of Toronto professor Geoffrey Hinton, a renowned
computer scientist.
Canada has become a magnet for tech companies. Google joins
Microsoft Corp., Amazon.com Inc. and Intel Corp. in building out
operations in major Canadian cities. They have been attracted by a
deep pool of educated labor, more-liberal immigration policies than
the U.S., and cultural similarities between the two countries.
Developers and engineers in Canada also command lower salaries than
those working in expensive high-tech centers like San Francisco and
New York.
Google's Stadia gaming studio, headed by Montreal-based industry
veteran Jade Raymond, will be adding software developers and
engineers to help create new games and boost its presence in
videogame streaming. Ms. Raymond previously ran studios at
Electronic Arts Inc. and Ubisoft Entertainment SA.
Google said it plans to add as many as 800 employees in Montreal
by 2022. It employs roughly 200 in the city currently.
Google unveiled Stadia last year, introducing a way for people
to play high-quality games online without a console. Like Microsoft
and a handful of others, the tech company is trying to move into
so-called cloud gaming, in which games are streamed over the
internet rather than on a player's own hardware. With Stadia,
players can stream games on computers and Google Pixel phones, as
well as TVs, using a Chromecast Ultra Device. The company said
subscribers will be able to play games on more devices later this
year.
The global videogame market generated an estimated $148.8
billion in revenue last year, according to research firm Newzoo BV.
Google already has a significant presence in mobile gaming through
its Google Play store for Android devices. Last year, the company
launched a subscription service called Play Pass that gives access
to games and other apps on the store for $4.99 a month. Apple Inc.
offers a similar service for its App Store.
--Sarah E. Needleman contributed to this article.
Write to Vipal Monga at vipal.monga@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
February 06, 2020 16:52 ET (21:52 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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