Google makes a HR AI play with launch of Gemini Enterprise

At Google’s Gemini at Work event, the tech giant announced a new chapter for its AI assistant, Gemini.

Google has launched Gemini Enterprise – in a blogpost, Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian called it “the new front door for AI in the workplace”.

He continued: “We’re bringing the best of Google AI to every employee, for every workflow.”

The idea is to make work easier by providing an AI-powered conversational platform where employees can “chat” directly with documents and business applications.

It also includes a suite of pre-built agents, as well as no code tools for employees to build their own agents.

All of this is embedded into the context of work as it pulls data from wherever it lives – whether that’s Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 to Salesforce to SAP.

Kurian wrote in his blog: “This isn’t just about making one task easier. It’s about making entire workflows smarter by searching and finding information from all your enterprise documents, applications, email and chat systems, and automating processes using agents with any of your enterprise applications.”

He shared on LinkedIn that some customers are already reaping the rewards of Gemini Enterprise – examples include banco BV, Gordon Food Service, Harvey, Macquarie Group and Virgin Voyages.

Google’s Gemini Enterprise competes with OpenAI, Anthropic & Microsoft’s workplace offerings

As Google CEO Sundar Pinchai wrote in a blogpost: “Gemini Enterprise is the entry point for organizations to access our full-stack innovations, and we’re excited to see how it helps teams do even more with AI.”

Of course, Google’s announcement brings the tech giant into competition with its AI rivals in the HR space, including Microsoft’s Copilot and OpenAI’s recently launched Job Platform.

Anthropic also announced last week it had signed a huge corporate partnership with Deloitte to deploy its AI tool, Claude, to 470,000 employees.

Talking about that partnership, Deloitte’s Global Technology and Ecosystems & Alliances Leader Ranjit Bawa said: “Deloitte is making this significant investment in Anthropic’s AI platform because our approach to responsible AI is very aligned, and together we can reshape how enterprises operate over the next decade.

“This expanded relationship includes technology integration, plans for the establishment of a Center of Excellence, continued certification of 15,000 professionals, and development of industry-specific solutions as we support our clients through their AI transformations.

“Anthropic shares our passion for safety and reliability, along with our assessment that enterprise AI should be both powerful and principled.”

Plus, Google has competition from large HR tech vendors themselves, whether that’s ServiceNow, Workday, SAP SuccessFactors, Oracle and Sage (to name a few). They are all making big bets in the AI space.

Part of Google’s pitch for Gemini Enterprise is that customers have access to an ecosystem of 100,000 partners. Hot on the heels of the Gemini Enterprise announcement, HR tech giant UKG shared an expanded partnership with Google Cloud.

Talking about that partnership, Kurian shared: “Through our expanded strategic partnership with UKG, we will help organizations use Gemini Enterprise and our AI to leverage workplace data insights in new and more meaningful ways.

Our work together will allow businesses to build and deploy sophisticated AI-powered applications that optimize workflows and improve employee experiences.”

Stay tuned for the future of AI in the world of work.