Google’s Last Stand? How India Became the Battleground in the AI War Against Microsoft?

In partnership with

Salutations, Olio aficionados! 👋

Welcome to the 188th edition of Weekly Olio. We’re thrilled to introduce a fresh new twist to your Sundays: Publisher Parmesan, our hand-picked, thoughtfully crafted edition designed to spark inspiration and insights for the week ahead.

It’s the perfect way to unwind, recharge, and prepare for the week with something truly worth savoring.

If you’re new here and you’re looking for more long-form, crispy writing, click the link to subscribe under this GIF 👇

A word from our Sponsors…

Learn Real Estate Investing from Wharton's Best Minds

In just 8 weeks, learn institutional-grade real estate analysis and modeling from Wharton faculty and seasoned investors.

You’ll gain:

• Insider insights on how top firms like Blackstone and KKR evaluate deals

• Exclusive invites to recruiting and networking events

• Direct access to Wharton faculty and a certificate that signals credibility

Join a thriving community of 5,000+ graduates for ongoing career development, networking, and deal flow.

Use code SAVE300 at checkout to save $300 on tuition.

Program starts October 6.

Enroll Today

Google’s Last Stand? How India Became the Battleground in the AI War Against Microsoft?

Google and Microsoft are no longer just competing to sell productivity tools. They’re competing to make sure you never have to choose AI at all—because it’s already baked into everything you do.

For now, Microsoft has the lead. The company tied OpenAI’s ChatGPT into Word, Excel, Teams, and Azure, making AI feel like an invisible utility rather than a separate product. Google, meanwhile, is scrambling. It’s reorganizing sales teams, raising prices, and most of all, pushing Gemini—its flagship AI model—into every product it can.

This is not just a Silicon Valley fight. One of the most important testing grounds happens to be India. With millions of businesses, billions of users, and a market that forces vendors to prove whether a tool is essential or just “nice-to-have,” India has become a real-world stress test for Google’s AI survival strategy.

Inside Google, the philosophy has shifted. The message to sales teams is simple: don’t sell Gmail, don’t sell Cloud—sell Gemini.

That means if you’re a Workspace customer, Gemini is now bundled into your plan. If you’re using Google Cloud, Gemini shows up in the package. The hope is that once customers are locked in, they’ll use it without much thought.

It’s a playbook that echoes Microsoft’s. Teams became ubiquitous not because people loved it, but because it came free with Office. Now Google is trying to pull off the same trick with AI.

But here’s the irony: Google actually invented the technology that made this AI revolution possible. Its 2017 paper introducing the “transformer” architecture laid the foundation for everything OpenAI, Anthropic, and others have since built. Then ChatGPT launched in 2022, Microsoft capitalized fast, and suddenly Google looked flat-footed.

By 2023, it was scrambling to catch up. By 2025, at least in India, Gemini has become the tip of the spear.

The India Test

So what does this strategy look like on the ground?

• Airtel uses Gemini to power customer service.

• Myntra has built a home décor feature with Gemini’s image generator.

• Nykaa, an e-commerce startup, uses Gemini’s multimodal API for visual search.

• Dashverse, an AI entertainment venture, is producing a full-length mythology epic using Gemini, VU, and Lyria.

These aren’t demos—they’re live deployments. Real companies are integrating Gemini into their workflows, which is why Google believes it can make the model unavoidable in India.

But India also happens to be the most price-sensitive large market in the world. And here’s where the fight gets cutthroat.

The Pricing War

Gemini Pro costs ₹1,950 a month, almost identical to ChatGPT+ (₹1,999). Google Cloud Pro comes in slightly lower at ₹1,740. But OpenAI recently threw a wrench into the market: an India-only ChatGPT Go plan at ₹399.

On the API side, Google charges $1.25 per million tokens for inputs and $10 for outputs, undercutting Anthropic’s Claude Opus ($15/$75) and matching GPT-5.

But Google is also pushing bundling hard. In India, Workspace pricing has been raised so Gemini is included whether customers want it or not. The logic: enterprises may hesitate to pay for AI separately, but if it’s already part of their tools, why not use it?

The real question is whether this feels like value—or forced adoption.

Locking in the Next Generation

Google has one big advantage: Workspace. With a 45% global share versus Microsoft 365’s 29%, and over 3 billion monthly users, it’s ahead on collaboration software.

But Cloud is another story. Google Cloud’s share is just 11%, compared to Microsoft Azure at 24% and AWS at 31%. And unlike email, cloud adoption is sticky—once an enterprise picks a provider, it usually stays there for years.

So Google’s pitch in India is this: even if you won’t switch from Microsoft Office, you might pick Google Cloud with Gemini for automation, storage, or workflow tools.

That’s a tall order in a country where Microsoft already has decades of enterprise relationships and AWS enjoys first-mover advantage.

It’s go-time for holiday campaigns

Roku Ads Manager makes it easy to extend your Q4 campaign to performance CTV.

You can:

• Easily launch self-serve CTV ads

• Repurpose your social content for TV

• Drive purchases directly on-screen with shoppable ads

• A/B test to discover your most effective offers

The holidays only come once a year. Get started now with a $500 ad credit when you spend your first $500 today with code: ROKUADS500. Terms apply.

Get started today.

Locking in the Next Generation

Google is also playing the long game. It made Gemini free for students in India, betting that once they graduate, they’ll bring those habits into the workplace.

It’s also highlighting privacy and compliance. In July, Google launched local machine learning processing for regulated sectors like healthcare and finance, a nod to enterprises nervous about sensitive data leaving Indian servers.

This is classic Google: arriving late, but hoping to win through infrastructure, distribution, and relentless bundling. Chrome wasn’t the first browser, but it won. Google Search wasn’t the first engine, but it dominated. Could Gemini follow the same path?

A Whole Stack, or Just Another Tool?

Gemini isn’t just a chatbot anymore—it’s the brand for Google’s entire AI suite:

• V0.3 for video

• Chirp for speech-to-text

• Gemma as its open-source model line

Google controls the full stack—data centers, chips, models, and applications. That means enterprises don’t just buy “an AI tool.” They buy into a subscription where AI comes attached by default.

The hope is that the question shifts from “Which AI should I buy?” to “Why buy anything else if Gemini is already included?”

The Stakes in India

For Google, India is not just another market—it’s a proving ground. If bundling and aggressive pricing can work here, they might work elsewhere too.

If it fails, Microsoft and Amazon will keep pulling ahead, leaving Google as the company that invented the future but couldn’t sell it.

In the end, the real cliffhanger isn’t whether Gemini is good enough. It’s whether Indian enterprises adopt it out of genuine enthusiasm—or because they simply can’t escape it.

And that decision, in a price-sensitive, scale-heavy market like India, might determine whether Google finally flips the script or remains stuck in second place in a race it started.

Interested in learning more about AI? Check out our previous coverage here:

• From Hype to How: 5 Lessons from the 2025 State of AI Report

• Reflections on OpenAI

• The Acceleration Era: AI After 2022 and What It Means for Builders

Business news as it should be.

Join 4M+ professionals who start their day with Morning Brew—the free newsletter that makes business news quick, clear, and actually enjoyable.

Each morning, it breaks down the biggest stories in business, tech, and finance with a touch of wit to keep things smart and interesting.

Try it yourself (for free)

That’s all for this week. If you enjoyed this edition, we’d really appreciate if you shared it with a friend, family member or colleague.

We’ll be back in your inbox 2 PM IST next Sunday. Till then, have a productive week!

Peeyush and Mohit

Disclaimer: The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in the text belong solely to the author, and not necessarily to the author's employer, organization, committee or other group or individual.