Google updates Drive to better support businesses

Google announced several new major updates on Drive for the benefit of businesses and enterprise users. The company also declared on Friday that its online file storage service now has 800 million daily active users, making it one of the leading online file storage services in the market today.

In line with its aim to better support businesses, Google focuses on improving Drive for teams. Its solution is called Team Drives, which is intended for enterprise file sharing.

Team Drives launched in preview in 2016 and is now geared to open the project up to all businesses. During the preview that lasted for around 6 months, the team was able to indentify key issues, particularly around permissions, that had to be fixed ahead of the general launch.

Google explained that all users within a company will be able to access the Team Drives, but admins can restrict access. One of its key benefits is its ability to centralise a business’s files and eliminate issues with content silos.

The new file sharing product is also aimed at providing businesses with an easier way to share files across their organisation. It also offers more granular access controls that shared folders contain.

Prior to the announcement, Google VP of Engineering Prabhakar Raghavan shared what pushed them to make the updates. “We took a look at that and said that a graphical user interface on top of the Unix ‘ls’ command is not that much of a value-add. So we asked: What does it take to really become a player in the enterprise,” Tech Crunch has quoted him saying.

The company also brings Quick Access from Android to iOS and the web. Quick Access learns from usage patterns and interactions across its services to deliver the right files. Raghavan said the feature is now generally available in both regular Google Drive and Time Drive. “We have enough machine learning power to look at your signals and serve up the file that we think you’re looking for," he added.

Raghavan said he thinks the most significant news is the unveiling of the Drive File Stream, which offers convenience to users with Windows or Mac laptop. Now users no longer have to worry about on-board hard-drive space and syncing the right thing to the right service as the new update will take care of those. A small group of customers had previously tested Team Drives before Google decided to make the testing available to a larger audience through its Early Adopter Program.