Google Spreadsheet: Does the biz model add up?

Posted Jun 8th 2006 11:02AM by Tom Taulli
Filed under: Products and Services, Consumer Experience, Google (GOOG), Microsoft (MSFT)

Of course, the next big thing from Google – a spreadsheet – is not new. After all, spreadsheets were one of the first key applications for the PC during the 1980s.

Yet, the Google Spreadsheet is very important, as the company is attempting to turn software into a service that lives on the Internet, not something that has to be purchased and installed.

Don't worry, Wall Street analysts will not dump their Microsoft Excel for the free Google alternative. Then again, this is not the vision for Google; rather, it provides a simple-to-use product. This is not to say it is simplistic. Actually, Google Spreadsheet has a comprehensive set of functions for math, finance and statistics. You can also import Excel spreadsheets (you will not lose the formatting in the process).

However, there are no charts; no printing; and no use of the right mouse button.

Of course, Google Spreadsheet takes advantage of the collaborative nature of the Web. This means you can allow other users to access and edit your spreadsheets (done with entering an email). This can be helpful for small companies or projects.

Actually, there has been a boon of new collaborative online applications. Take JotSpot, which has more than 25 Web-based business applications. Six months ago, JotSpot released an online spreadsheet called Tracker.

I interviewed Joe Kraus, who is the CEO and co-founder of JotSpot (he is also the co-founder of Excite): "We wanted to do things that you can only do on the Web like attaching documents to cells and access controls. Our belief is that people want to collaborate in multiple ways, old and new."

Kraus believes that companies and even consumers will pay for this software (his company has 2,000 customers so far).

How about Google? It's business model for its spreadsheet is not clear yet. But, since it is already free, it would be difficult to start charging a fee in the future. Thus, given Google's track record, it would not be surprising that the company pursues an ad-based model.

But, is it viable? For example, I'm a frequent user of the Excel spreadsheet. When doing such work, my goal is to accomplish a particular task, such as building a forecast. But, am I really interested in looking at ads? Actually, having ads my irritate me.

Perhaps, with the enormous size of Google's user base, it can pick-up a decent amount of ad revenue – compared to the low cost of building, maintaining and distributing the product. But, in terms of this being a killer of Microsoft's dominance in the Office Suite market, it's a long shot. If anything, maybe Google should make a change -- and actually charge a fee or rental for these new types of online apps.

Tags: Excel, Google, Google Spreadsheet, GoogleSpreadsheet, Jotspot, Microsoft

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

6-08-2006 @ 2:06PM

Segu said...

Hope you would like to try out http://zohosheet.com , an online spreadsheet app., which have comprehensive set of basic excel functionality including Charting and Multiple sheets.

Cheers,
Segu

6-08-2006 @ 4:13PM

Dimitar Vesselinov said...

USS Google vs USS Microsoft

"In the navy, the 1st rule of engagement with an enemy ship is to try to hit it with multiple missiles coming from multiple directions. Most naval ships can handle one missile shot at them fairly easily using chaff, electronic warfare or even shooting it down with good old shotguns. But throw at that same ship multiple missiles at about the same time, and it'll have its crew running around like chickens without heads trying to figure out which threat to handle first.

With each new product Google announces (latest being Google Spreadsheets), I can't help but think that Google is brilliantly applying naval missile tactics at USS Microsoft."
http://galai.typepad.com/blog/2006/06/in_the_navy_the.html

6-08-2006 @ 6:44PM

Eric Johnson said...

From a business perspective this is difficult to understand. If all of these new projects would add a new revenue stream to the Google corporation it would be good. But they do not. So far it is only web search and gmail that is anything to shout about.

6-25-2006 @ 6:24AM

Travis Jarvis said...

Key to Google's future success lies in differentiating itself from the rest of the software market. I beleive that Google is doing an excellent job of that, through offering a feasible business proposition for its offerings, keeping things simple (and cost effective), and not hesitating to challenge the conventional. They however have to remember that market share is not a good business goal.