Resilience in Search pushes up Google’s Q1 revenues to $69.8 bn

“Resilience in Search and momentum in Cloud resulted in Q1 consolidated revenues of $69.8 billion, up 3% year over year, or up 6% in constant currency. We remain committed to delivering long-term growth and creating capacity to invest in our most compelling growth areas by re-engineering our cost base,” Ruth Porat, CFO of Alphabet and Google, said why commenting on the Internet giant’s financial results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2023.

Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet and Google, said, “We are pleased with our business performance in the first quarter, with Search performing well and momentum in Cloud. We introduced important product updates anchored in deep computer science and AI. Our North Star is providing the most helpful answers for our sers, and we see huge opportunities ahead, continuing our long track record of innovation.”

While Google’s advertising revenue beat analyst expectations, there was a slight dip in Q1 2023 at $54.55 billion, from $54.66 billion in Q1 2022. YouTube’s advertising revenue also saw a decline from $6.86 billion in Q1 2022 to $6.69 billion, even as it stayed in line with analyst expectations.

Alphabet also announced $2.6 billion in charges related to reductions in its workforce and office space during the first quarter. In January 2023, Alphabet announced a reduction of its workforce, and as a result in the first quarter of 2023 the company recorded employee severance and related charges of $2.0 billion, representing the majority of expected costs associated with this action. In addition, Alphabet is taking actions to optimise its global office space, and as a result the company recorded charges related to office space reductions of $564 million in the first quarter of 2023. Alphabet stated that it might incur additional charges in the future as it further evaluates its real estate needs.