Michael Liedtke and Wyatte Grantham-Philips, Associated Press
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) – Google has signed an agreement to buy cybersecurity company Wiz for $32 billion, making it the largest acquisition in Tech Giant’s 26-year history.
The proposed acquisition, announced Tuesday, is part of Google’s aggressive expansion into cloud computing during the artificial intelligence boom. The enthusiastic push for AI is driving data center demand, with Google playing against two other tech powerhouses: Microsoft and Amazon.
If full speed trading is approved by regulators, Wiz will join Google Cloud. This is an increasingly important part of the business apart from search and advertising operations that take most of the annual revenue into account at Google’s parent company Alphabet.
However, with the advent of AI, the cloud division has become a rising star of Google. The sector’s annual revenue, which was $26.3 billion in 2022, rose 64% last year to $43.2 billion.
“Both Wiz and Google Cloud are spurred by the belief that cloud security needs to be easier, more accessible, more intelligent and democratized, allowing more organizations to adopt and use cloud and AI safely.”
Google CEO Sundar Pichai added in a statement from Google Cloud and Wiz, “The ability to use multiple clouds has been improved.”
New York-based WIZ was founded in 2020 and creates security tools designed to protect information stored in remote data centers. Its clients range from small startups to large government organizations.
Google has been watching Wiz for a while. The selling prices announced this week are far more abundant than the reported $23 billion acquisition Wiz rejected last July. However, recent stock market volatility has cooled the IPO market, and now Rappaport said he expects Wiz to “innovate even faster” by becoming a part of Google.
Wedbush analysts have purchased “A Shot Adrow the Bow” from Google’s Move To To Buy Wiz from other tech giants, especially Microsoft and Amazon. Google was behind the competition in the cloud space, Wedbush said, but the acquisition of Wiz could change parameters.
Tuesday’s bid easily overturns what was Google’s biggest acquisition. In 2012, the $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility, which didn’t pay off the way California’s Mountain View wanted.
Other forays of Google have turned into gold mines, but most notably, it purchased the $1.76 billion acquisition of online video pioneer YouTube in 2006 and the $3.1 billion ad technology platform DoubleClick in 2008.
The DoubleClick transaction is currently part of an antitrust case filed with the US Department of Justice, targeting Google’s technology to distribute ads throughout the Internet. A ruling is expected this year in that case, including allegations that Google illegally abused its authority to manipulate digital ad prices.
Google’s Wiz bid arrives to dodge attempts by regulators at home and abroad to dissolve the company’s internet empire.
A federal judge in another case brought the Department of Justice last year, and Google concluded that it had turned the ubiquitous search engine into an illegal monopoly. The penalty stage of the trial will begin next month.
The Department of Justice seeks responsibilities, including the requirement for Google to sell Chrome web browsers, bans agreements with Apple and other companies, and makes search engines the default tool for finding online information on iPhones and other devices.
Wiz trading is also common among antitrust regulators. Many hope that the Trump administration will become more accessible to business transactions, but in itself indicates it is unstable with big technology.
The WIZ deal raises antitrust concerns due to the potential impact on standalone cybersecurity vendors and the potential disruption of larger rivals. Still, Wedbush analysts say the industry is “ried for integration.”
Wiz and Google say Wiz’s products will continue to work in all major clouds, via Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Oracle Cloud, and other security partners.
Google and Wiz expect trading to close in 2026 in accordance with the regulations Greenlight and other closure conditions.
Shares of Google owner Alphabet fell about 3% during trading late Tuesday morning.
Grantham-Philips reported from New York.
Original release: March 18, 2025 11:51am EDT
