Google plans to expand its research and development (R&D) division to include a team dedicated to blockchain and other technologies, Bloomberg reported on Thursday, citing an email from the firm.
The new Google Labs R&D group will focus on blockchain-based use cases and aim to explore similar emerging technologies such as distributed computing and data storage.
While the team is smaller than other divisions, the research will improve Google’s internal data storage and management needs, despite no plans to launch enterprise or consumer-grade use cases to date.
The project is being led by Shivakumar Venkataraman, Vice President for Engineering at Google, who previously worked on Google’s advertising and payments infrastructure R&D teams.
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The news comes after Google founded its Labs division last November, following an internal restructuring amid the rise of rival R&D teams at Meta highly-successful Reality Labs.
In addition to blockchain research, Google Labs is also exploring augmented reality (AR), smart glasses, and cryptocurrency technologies.
Also, the ‘Experiments with Google’ division focuses on homegrown projects featuring pre-existing Google technologies such as WebXR and artificial intelligence (AI).
In a recent interview, Google announced that it will update its digital wallet system to store cryptocurrencies such as Coinbase and BitPay in the future.
Bill Ready, President of Commerce for Google, said in a statement:
“Crypto is something we pay a lot of attention to […] As user demand and merchant demand evolves, we’ll evolve with it”
He added Google wants to turn its digital pay and wallet system into a comprehensive infrastructure to support more than digital currencies.
Currently, the Mountain View-based firm is working on ways to improve how its existing e-wallet storage systems support digital tokens such as event tickets, airline tickets, and vaccine passports.
At the moment, Google supports many other augmented, virtual, and mixed reality (AR/VR/MR) projects. Outside of its hardware ambitions, Google has various immersive apps already available such as Google Blocks VR, Google Earth VR, Google ARCore, Google Lens.
Rival firm Meta Platforms Inc is also working with its own Reality Labs R&D team to develop upcoming AR/VR/MR hardware, including its MR smartwatch, Quest Pro headset and future Nazare headsets following a list of huge announcements at last year’s Connect 2021 event.
