Google\u2019s Cloud Next 2024 event takes place in Las Vegas through Thursday, and that means lots of new cloud-focused news on everything from Gemini, Google\u2019s AI-powered chatbot<\/a>, to AI to devops and security. Last year\u2019s event was the first in-person Cloud Next since 2019, and Google took to the stage to show off its ongoing dedication to AI with its Duet AI for Gmail<\/a> and many other debuts<\/a>, including expansion of generative AI to its security product line<\/a> and other enterprise-focused updates and debuts<\/a>.<\/p>\n Don\u2019t have time to watch the full archive of Google\u2019s keynote event<\/a>? That\u2019s OK; we\u2019ve summed up the most important parts of the event below, with additional details from the TechCrunch team on the ground at the event. And Tuesday\u2019s updates weren\u2019t the only things Google made available to non-attendees \u2014 Wednesday\u2019s developer-focused stream started at 10:30 a.m. PT<\/a>.<\/p>\n Leveraging AI to help customers develop creative content is something Big Tech is looking for, and Tuesday, Google introduced its version. Google Vids, a new AI-fueled video creation tool<\/a>, is the latest feature added to the Google Workspace.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s how it works: Google claims users can make videos alongside other Workspace tools like Docs and Sheets. The editing, writing and production is all there. You also can collaborate with colleagues in real time within Google Vids. Read more<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n After reading about Google\u2019s new Gemini Code Assist<\/a>, an enterprise-focused AI code completion and assistance tool, you may be asking yourself if that sounds familiar. And you would be correct. TechCrunch Senior Editor Frederic Lardinois writes that \u201cGoogle previously offered a similar service<\/a> under the now-defunct Duet AI branding.\u201d Then Gemini came along. Code Assist is a direct competitor to GitHub\u2019s Copilot Enterprise. Here\u2019s why<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n And to put Gemini Code Assist into context, Alex Wilhelm breaks down its competition with Copilot, and its potential risks and benefits to developers, in the latest TechCrunch Minute episode.<\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Google<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Among the new features are voice prompts to kick off the AI-based \u201cHelp me write\u201d feature in Gmail while on the go<\/a>. Another one for Gmail includes a way to instantly turn rough email drafts into a more polished email. Over on Sheets, you can send out a customizable alert when a certain field changes. Meanwhile, a new set of templates make starting a new spreadsheet easier. For the Doc lovers, there is support for tabs now. This is good because, according to the company, you can \u201corganize information in a single document instead of linking to multiple documents or searching through Drive.\u201d Of course, subscribers get the goodies first. Read more<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Google also seems to have plans to monetize two of its new AI features for the Google Workspace productivity suite. This will look like $10\/month\/user add-on packages. One will be for the new AI meetings and messaging add-on that takes notes for you, provides meeting summaries and translates content into 69 languages. The other is for the introduced AI security package, which helps admins keep Google Workspace content more secure. Read more<\/strong><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n In February, Google announced an image generator built into Gemini, Google\u2019s AI-powered chatbot. The company pulled it\u00a0shortly after it was found to be randomly injecting gender and racial diversity<\/a> into prompts about people. This resulted in some offensive inaccuracies. While we waited for an eventual re-release, Google came out with the enhanced image-generating tool, Imagen 2<\/a>. This is inside its Vertex AI developer platform and has more of a focus on enterprise. Imagen 2 is now generally available and comes with some fun new capabilities, including <\/span>inpainting and outpainting. There\u2019s also what <\/span>Google\u2019s calling \u201ctext-to-live images\u201d where you<\/span>\u00a0can now create short, four-second videos from text prompts, along the lines of AI-powered clip generation tools like <\/span>Runway<\/a>,\u00a0<\/span>Pika<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<\/span>Irreverent Labs<\/a>. Read more<\/strong><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n We can all use a little bit of help, right? Meet Google\u2019s Vertex AI Agent Builder, a new tool to help companies build AI agents.<\/p>\n \u201cVertex AI Agent Builder allows people to very easily and quickly build conversational agents,\u201d Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian said. \u201cYou can build and deploy production-ready, generative AI-powered conversational agents and instruct and guide them the same way that you do humans to improve the quality and correctness of answers from models.\u201d<\/p>\n To do this, the company uses a process called \u201cgrounding,\u201d where the answers are tied to something considered to be a reliable source. In this case, it\u2019s relying on Google Search (which in reality could or could not be accurate). Read more<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Google calls Gemini in Databases<\/a> a collection of features that \u201csimplify all aspects of the database journey.\u201d In less jargony language, it\u2019s a bundle of AI-powered, developer-focused tools for Google Cloud customers who are creating, monitoring and migrating app databases. Read more<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> MirageC \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Google has offered cloud sovereignties before, but now it is focused more on partnerships<\/a> rather than building them out on their own. Read more<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Google jumps on board the productizing generative AI-powered security tool train<\/a> with a number of new products and features aimed at large companies. Those include Threat Intelligence, which can analyze large portions of potentially malicious code. It also lets users perform natural language searches for ongoing threats or indicators of compromise. Another is Chronicle, Google\u2019s cybersecurity telemetry offering for cloud customers to assist with cybersecurity investigations. The third is the enterprise cybersecurity and risk management suite Security Command Center. Read more<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n One of the anticipated announcements is Nvidia\u2019s next-generation Blackwell platform<\/a> coming to Google Cloud in early 2025. Yes, that seems so far away. However, here is what to look forward to: support for the high-performance Nvidia HGX B200 for AI and HPC workloads and GB200 NBL72 for large language model (LLM) training. Oh, and we can reveal that the GB200 servers will be liquid-cooled. Read more<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Meanwhile, Google is expanding its Chrome Enterprise product suite with the launch of Chrome Enterprise Premium<\/a>. What\u2019s new here is that it mainly pertains mostly to security capabilities of the existing service, based on the insight that browsers are now the endpoints where most of the high-value work inside a company is done. Read more<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Google<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Everyone can use a \u201chalf\u201d every now and again, and Google obliges with <\/a>Gemini 1.5 Pro. This, Kyle Wiggers writes, is \u201cGoogle\u2019s most capable generative AI model,\u201d and is now available in public preview on Vertex AI, Google\u2019s enterprise-focused AI development platform. Here\u2019s what you get for that half: T<\/span>he amount of context that it can process, which is from 128,000 tokens up to 1 million tokens, where \u201ctokens\u201d refers to subdivided bits of raw data (like the syllables \u201cfan,\u201d \u201ctas\u201d and \u201ctic\u201d in the word \u201cfantastic\u201d). Read more<\/span><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n At Google Cloud Next 2024, the company debuted a number of open source tools<\/a> primarily aimed at supporting generative AI projects and infrastructure. One is Max Diffusion, which is a collection of reference implementations of various diffusion models that run on XLA, or Accelerated Linear Algebra, devices. Then there is JetStream, a new engine to run generative AI models. The third is MaxTest, a collection of text-generating AI models targeting TPUs and Nvidia GPUs in the cloud. Read more<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Image Credits:<\/strong> Google<\/p>\n<\/div>\n We don\u2019t know a lot about this one, however, here is what we do know<\/a>:\u00a0Google Cloud joins AWS and Azure in announcing its first custom-built Arm processor, dubbed Axion. Frederic Lardinois writes that \u201cbased on Arm\u2019s Neoverse 2 designs, Google says its Axion instances offer 30% better performance than other Arm-based instances from competitors like AWS and Microsoft and up to 50% better performance and 60% better energy efficiency than comparable X86-based instances.\u201d Read more<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n If all of that isn\u2019t enough of an AI and cloud update deluge, you can watch the entire event keynote via the embed below.<\/p>\nGoogle Vids<\/h2>\n
Gemini Code Assist<\/h2>\n
Google Workspace<\/h2>\n
Imagen 2<\/h2>\n
Vertex AI Agent Builder<\/h2>\n
Gemini comes to databases<\/h2>\n
Google renews its focus on data sovereignty<\/h2>\n
![\"closed](\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/padlock-badly-handled-breaches.jpg?w=680\")
<\/p>\nSecurity tools get some AI love<\/h2>\n
![\"Data](\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/GettyImages-1420039843.jpg?w=680\")
<\/p>\nNvidia\u2019s Blackwell platform<\/h2>\n
Chrome Enterprise Premium<\/h2>\n
Gemini 1.5 Pro<\/h2>\n
![\"Google](\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/02\/Gemini1.5Pro_AIStudio_Sherlock-Jr._2.png?w=680\")
<\/p>\nOpen source tools<\/h2>\n
![\"Open](\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/GettyImages-1291641896.jpg?w=680\")
<\/p>\nAxion<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/google-axion.jpg\")
<\/p>\nThe entire Google Cloud Next keynote<\/h2>\n
Google Cloud Next\u2019s developer keynote<\/h2>\n