Will SketchUp Survive Google's Downturn?

Even the mighty Google is battening down its hatches to weather the economic storm. The company's ceo suggests non-profitable software might be cut:

Non-revenue generating products will starve if they're not killed altogether. Projects the company is just "fiddling with," Eric Schmidt told the WSJ "will get naturally smaller as people get plucked off."

Does SketchUp generate revenue? There's the $500 "Pro" version, but I would assume most of the millions of downloaded copies are the free version.

There's the online warehouse that goes along with SketchUp: does it generate revenue? We don't know, because Google hasn't ever said. They won't even release download figures for its CAD products.

Another bad sign: Google is closing one of two offices in Denver, the original home of SketchUp.

(Google has/will-be/could-be shutting down or merging the following products initially: SearchMash, Lively, Google Page Creator, Google Audio Indexing, and Google Notebook.)

The company has traditionally been closed-mouthed relative to other technology firms. This was a marketing benefit in good times, when it could afford to be mysterious and all-knowing in a god-like manner. Now that bad times are upon it, customers want to know what's happening to products they rely on. The devil's in the details, as it were.

Source.

Update

Still no word on SketchUp sales figures, but Google pr explains the office closings:

To clarify, there are currently two Google offices open in Colorado: Thornton and Boulder. Our Denver office was consolidated with the Thornton office back in October, and business at our Boulder office, where SketchUp is based, continues as usual.

Comments

[RobiNZ]

Maybe Autodesk will swoop...

[Matt Ritzman]

Is SketchUp itself profitable?

Probably not. As you said, most of the downloads are the free version. But the program isn't a complete financial loss. I suspect that most of the people who use it professionally have shelled out the cash to purchase the Pro version. Even then, the Pro version is priced so low, I doubt it has a significant margin, even if it pays for development costs.

On the other hand, SketchUp is a fairly mature product by Google standards. It is part of an ecosphere of related products, it provides content for Warehouse and Google Earth. Both of these are much closer to Google's core competencies of search and ad revenue, and all three are extremely well integrated.

I haven't seen a lot of attempts to make a profit off of Warehouse or Earth. The money making methods are either very well hidden or they haven't been explored very deeply. I expect to see much more exploration of possibilities before the SketchUp product is in danger of falling by the wayside.

Will SketchUp survive the downturn?

No doubt, but I'm sure they'll be tightening their belts like the rest of us.

[Royal Farros]

SketchUp has certainly gotten important enough in the industry to ask this question.

Google won't shut down high traffic projects... because that's what Google does: Create huge traffic, then figure out how to monetize that traffic.

It's estimated that Google Earth has about 300 million users... and SketchUp is one of the key technologies that drive Google Earth.

So, like YouTube, that's huge monetization potential, can't see them giving it up.

Note, wasn't the Denver closure a consolidation of sales offices (not related to dev)?

[AutoCADforMac]

"Now that bad times are upon it, customers want to know what's happening to products they rely on."

Here's to the new world of hosting all of your crucial email, documents, project plans, accounting data, and family keepsake pictures in "the cloud"!