Cloud Computing: Google and Amazon are Brick & Mortar Bound
February 12, 2012
Aping Apple, Google wants to open a 1,323-square-foot open-to-the-public retail store complete with an eye-catching mezzanine visible from the street at its European headquarters in Dublin, according to a local planning application.
It hasn’t explained what it wants to sell there but the mezzanine area is for visiting "business partners and contributors."
Maybe it’ll sell the Android-based, smartphone- or tablet-operated "home-entertainment system that streams music wirelessly throughout the home" that the Wall Street Journal said Thursday it’s developing and means to move under its own brand. The widgetry, which might stream other media, is reportedly due later this year after years of tinkering…
The Dublin site is Google’s largest location outside the US, with expectations of housing 3,000 employees.
Meanwhile, the Good E-Reader blog claims Amazon is going to open a retail boutique in Seattle, where it lives, before the end of the year peddling Kindles, Fire 2s, books and accessories. It reportedly wants to test the market’s taste for a chain.