Google just released its financials for Q2 2015, the first such release the company is making under the guidance of new CFO Ruth Porat. The company made revenues of $17.7 billion, an 11 percent year-over-year increase. While Google's still growing, things have slowed a bit since last year, though — in Q2 2014, the company increased revenue 22 percent over the previous year.
As usual, advertising is what is making Google money; total advertising revenue of $16 billion was also up 11 percent over the prior year, but Google's small "other revenues" category grew 17 percent over Q2 2014. That includes revenues from products like the Google Play Store; Porat said that the company saw "substantial growth" in the Google Play business, but that growth was offset by declines in the company's hardware business.
Google is still growing — just not as fast
Porat cited growth in mobile search advertising as well as YouTube as two key drivers for overall revenue growth — a message similar to what Google cited as important factors going forward last quarter. Indeed, she led off the earnings call with a bit on YouTube, noting that the platform has been delivering great user engagement — in numbers, she said that watch time on YouTube is up 60 percent year over year, the fastest growth rate the company has seen in two years. Mobile YouTube watch time has likewise doubled in the last year.
While Google is still growing, the slowing revenue growth may start to show its impact in other parts of the business. Earlier this week, The Wall Street Journal reported that the company would slow down its typically aggressive hiring strategy to save money, and indicated that other changes may be afoot. Much like its revenue, Google is still growing — just not as fast as it used to.