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Back to Sundar Pichai on what's next for Google Gemini, Waymo, and data centers in space, with Sundar Pichai.

Why Is Google Investing After Free Cash Flow Went Negative?

Sundar Pichai says the resolve to keep investing comes from the strength and durability of demand, from consumer products through to enterprise. Alex Heath said Google went cash-flow negative over the summer for the first time since the IPO, and Sundar Pichai confirmed it was free cash flow.

He says a bet of this size needs confidence at several levels. Google is seeing robust demand across that range, and it has its own demand signal from how Google uses AI. Separately, internal evals show the capability curve, including how new models compare with older ones. Asked whether Gemini 5.0 will be much better than Argon, he says yes. Google is also signing durable long-term contracts with committed revenue, so the plan is a book of business and not only a hope.

Sundar Pichai says Google takes all of that into account and is leaning in, in a responsible and disciplined way. Alex Heath noted that land and power planning is already aimed at 2028 and 2029.

Transcript

Sundar Pichai on what's next for Google Gemini, Waymo, and data centers in space ·

Sources with Alex Heath

More from this episode

  1. How Many Tokens Did Gemini 4 Use in 72 Hours?Sundar Pichai says Gemini 4 Argon drew almost 25 trillion tokens in the first 72 hours after launch, about 3 times what Gemini 3.0 saw in that same window.
  2. How Do Google Researchers Co-work With Models?Sundar Pichai says Google is definitely at a stage where AI researchers co-work with the models in a deep way.
  3. Why Did Google Change Who Runs DeepMind?Sundar Pichai says Google changed who runs frontier models at DeepMind because that work has become an all-consuming job of its own.
  4. Who Still Makes Google's Compute Decisions?Sundar Pichai says the big compute decisions are still made by people in the loop, including him.
  5. Why Do AI Agents Use Web Browsers?Sundar Pichai says agents will keep using browsers and computers because a person would do the same thing, and because that makes it easier to keep the user…
  6. Why Is Google Putting AI Data Centers in Space?Sundar Pichai says Project Suncatcher is Google's pilot, with Planet Labs and SpaceX, for AI data centers in space. Alex Heath asked whether it was still up.
  7. How Many Paid Rides Does Waymo Do Each Week?Sundar Pichai says Waymo just crossed half a million paid rides per week. The team is focused on scaling that number.
  8. When Will Quantum Have Practical Commercial Uses?Sundar Pichai says he genuinely sees practical commercial applications for quantum in a five-year time frame.

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