Google Launches Cloud WAN to Enhance Network Resilience and Support AI-Powered Businesses Globally

In March 2024, a suspected undersea avalanche severely damaged four subsea cables along the West African coast, causing significant internet outages from Côte d'Ivoire to South Africa. While many businesses were left without a stable connection, Google's Equiano subsea cable remained functional, ensuring that Google Cloud customers continued to operate smoothly. This incident highlighted the robustness of Google's global network, which has evolved significantly over the past 25 years to meet the growing demands of modern technology. Google's global wide area network (WAN) is a massive infrastructure spanning 2 million miles of lit fiber, featuring 33 subsea cables and 202 network edge locations that connect 42 cloud regions and 127 cloud zones. It is highly reliable, thanks to round-the-clock monitoring and maintenance. The network's evolution has been driven by the changing needs of various Google applications and services. Initially, the focus was on reliability, scale, and efficiency to support applications like Search and Ads. With the acquisition of YouTube and the shift to streaming, the network adapted to handle high-definition video content, emphasizing quality delivery. The emergence of cloud computing and Google Cloud marked a significant turning point. The network had to evolve to ensure greater resiliency, security, and regional reliability, as it now supported not only Google's internal applications but also its growing customer base. The advent of the AI era presented even more challenges, with the massive data volumes required for AI-powered apps and model training. To address this, Google introduced a multi-shard horizontal network architecture, allowing for swift capacity scaling and enhanced redundancy. Each shard operates independently, and both the capacity within each shard and the number of shards can be increased as needed. This approach increased Google's WAN bandwidth by 7 times between 2020 and 2025. At the Google Cloud Next 25 conference, the company announced the availability of its global network to external customers for the first time through a new service called Google Cloud WAN. According to Satish Kondalam, Group Product Manager, connectivity has become increasingly complex for enterprises, often resulting in fragmented networks that are costly and difficult to manage. Cloud WAN aims to simplify this by providing a single, high-speed, and secure solution for site-to-site and cloud connectivity, thereby reducing total cost of ownership (TCO) and improving network performance. One of the key features of Cloud WAN is the Premium Tier network, which routes traffic through the geographically closest network edge location, minimizing latency and enhancing user experience. This technology leverages the extensive and redundant infrastructure Google has built, offering a scalable and resilient solution for businesses dealing with the intense data demands of AI and other advanced applications. Nestlé, the world’s largest food and beverage company, is among the early adopters of Cloud WAN. They shifted to a cloud-based network backbone and deployed Cloud WAN, including the Premium Tier network, to connect their branches to their cloud ecosystem. Following this deployment, Nestlé reported a 40% improvement in app performance and reduced costs, demonstrating the tangible benefits of the new service. Subhasree Mandal, a lead on the Global Network Technology team, expresses pride and excitement about the network's evolution and its new role in serving external customers. She notes that the network's ability to handle a diverse array of applications and data volumes is a significant responsibility, one that Google has embraced with dedication. The success of early adopters like Nestlé underscores Google's readiness to help businesses worldwide achieve better connectivity and performance. Industry insiders view the launch of Google Cloud WAN as a game-changer in the realm of enterprise network connectivity. The service's ability to simplify complex network setups and reduce costs while maintaining high performance and security is expected to appeal to a wide range of businesses, particularly those in the AI and cloud space. Google's reputation for technological innovation and network reliability further strengthens the case for Cloud WAN, making it a compelling option for companies looking to future-proof their network infrastructure. Google, known for its cutting-edge technology and global reach, has established itself as a leader in cloud services. The launch of Cloud WAN is a strategic move to extend its network capabilities to a broader audience, leveraging its substantial investment in infrastructure to offer robust, scalable, and efficient connectivity solutions. This offering is poised to reshape the landscape of enterprise networking, making it easier and more cost-effective for businesses to navigate the complexities of the digital age.