Alphabet announced that its revenue was up 14 percent to $84.7 billion in Q2, slightly outperforming expectations. Profits rose 29 percent to $23.6 billion, beating analyst targets by $900 million. Search continued to be a top performer, generating $48.5 billion in the three-month period ending June 30, while Google advertising was up 10.5 percent to $64.6 billion. Google CEO Sundar Pichai said the company’s cloud and generative AI solutions “are being used by more than 2 million developers.” The Google Cloud services unit surpassed the $10 billion quarterly revenue mark for the first time. “We are innovating at every layer of the AI stack,” Pichai added.

Google Cloud notched $1 billion in operating profit, Alphabet CFO Ruth Porat, who also holds the titles president and chief investment officer, explained in the Q2 earnings announcement. The financial results were released as Google’s $23 billion acquisition offer was rejected by cybersecurity startup Wiz, eyed to enhance Google Cloud.

Google’s reported offer  to purchase Wiz was turned down in favor of the startup’s plan for an initial public offering, per CNBC.

Google’s ad growth shows that marketing via the search giant “continues to grow after rising inflation and interest rates tightened marketing budgets in 2022 and 2023,” according to CNBC, which points out that while YouTube advertising missed Wall Street revenue estimates by about 3 percent, “it still grew to $8.66 billion compared to $7.66 billion in the year-ago quarter.”

Increased competition from social sites including TikTok continue to challenge Alphabet’s streaming video platform, which CNBC calls “the largest video platform in the world.”

Alphabet’s market cap passed the $2 trillion mark in April, a feat it accomplished briefly in 2021, but has sustained with more authority this year.

Google is pursuing an “aggressive rollout of artificial intelligence,” writes The New York Times, noting that the company has already “incorporated generative AI into all of its products and increased its spending on data centers and associated hardware to underpin the technology.”

The Verge predicts Google “will likely see another big boost in business following its earlier-than-usual hardware event coming in August, where it’s going to launch the already-revealed Pixel 9 and Pixel 9 Pro Fold.”