Stadia

Stadia’s future includes running the backend of other streaming platforms, job listing reveals

Ben Schoon | Jul 29 2021 - 5:57 am PT

After closing its in-house Stadia Games & Entertainment studios earlier this year, many have wondered what the future of Google’s game streaming ambitions will look like. Apparently, it will indeed include Stadia becoming the backend of other streaming platforms as a “white label” option.

Backtracking for a moment, what would this mean for Stadia? A “white label” product in this context essentially means that one company will license the tools and product to another company that, in turn, can sell it under its own name. As a theoretical example, Google could work with Ubisoft to provide a “white label” version of Stadia that Ubisoft could then sell to its customers as an Ubisoft-branded cloud gaming offering, perhaps in the Ubisoft+ subscription.

A job listing on LinkedIn spotted by CloudyGames seems to confirm that this is, at least in part, what Google wants to do with its Stadia technology going forward. The recently posted listing is looking for a product manager and refers to the chance to white label Stadia as an “important opportunity” as a part of Google’s goal to ensure the gaming product is a “long-term, sustainable” business.

In addition to building our own video game platform, we see an important opportunity to make our infrastructure and tools available to partners who want to build their own interactive streaming platforms. Our goal is to build a long-term, sustainable business that helps grow the industry across gaming and other interactive streaming applications.

Google first hinted at this as a possibility back in February, pushing the message of supporting its partners in the industry pretty heavily alongside the closure of SG&E, with Phil Harrison saying that there was “increased focus on using our technology platform for industry partners.”

Ironically, this is the same job listing we spotted a few weeks ago, but the language above either went unnoticed or was added after our coverage.

It remains unclear at this point if Google’s goal to white label Stadia will result in the closure of the product in its current state. Google has not commented on the job listing, but we’ll be monitoring it for changes.