Google has roped in former Microsoft executive Anil Bhansali as the Vice President of Engineering for Google Cloud in India. He would be handling all software development support efforts for the company in the country.
Bhansali was a long-term employee of Microsoft and served the company for over 28 years. In his last assignment at the Redmond-headquartered technology giant, he was VP of Azure cloud division and site leader for the company’s research and development in India. He also led engineering roles across Microsoft’s office, search, and window divisions.
Bhansali is the second hire at the top level as Google Cloud looks to beef up its play against rivals Amazon Web Services (AWS), Azure, and Alicloud. Google local’s cloud division also roped in another Microsoft alumni, Karan Bajwa as managing director in March this year. He joined Google Cloud from IBM where he served as India and South Asia managing director.
“We’re very excited that Bhansali has joined Google Cloud to help grow and scale our software development support efforts in India so we can continue expanding and advancing Google Cloud services that are used by customers in more than 150 countries worldwide,” said Amit Zavery, Vice President, Engineering, Google LLC, in a statement.
Recently, Google had also announced its plans to open its second data center in Delhi in 2021 which will be the company’s second cloud region in India after Mumbai. As of now, Google’s existing network stands at 8 regions in the Asia Pacific and 22 regions globally.
AWS has been dominating the cloud market in India for years while Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and Microsoft have been trailing in terms of adoption. Experts believe that AWS had the first-mover advantage and very strong word-of-mouth amongst the developer community.
Microsoft’s Azure also struggled but it used several tactics including investments to win large contracts. It backed Flipkart and ride-hailing major Ola. Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries had partnered Microsoft cloud platform to launch new cloud data centres in India in August 2019.
Google Cloud counts Hero Motocorp, ICICI Prudential, Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories, Indiamart, L&T Finance, Oyo Hotels and Homes, Wipro, and Truecaller among several others as its anchor clients.