Google plans to further expand Gemini in 2025

Just before the holidays, Google released Android XR, co-designed with Samsung, to quite a splash. However, it may not be long before more big announcements are made, and Geminis will be at the forefront of most of them.
According to CNBC, Google held its “2025 Strategy Meeting” in mid-December, where Google CEO Sundar Pichai and other Google executives elaborated on their expectations for the next few years. Pichai even said that “the stakes are high” and “2025 will be critical.”
This comes after a series of court trials, some related to Google’s advertising practices and others that could lead to Chrome and Android needing to be sold. At the same time, Google continues to invest heavily in Gemini, and Pichai said, “Expanding Gemini on the consumer side will be our biggest focus next year.”
In the past month alone, Google has rolled out quite a few updates for Gemini. These include features like the Deep Research feature, which is billed as “your personal AI research assistant” and is already available. At the same time, Gemini 2.0 Flash Experimental was released, providing an updated AI model that supports multi-modal input and “doubled the speed in key benchmark tests”, which is better than Gemini 1.5 Pro.
Google’s internal goal is for Gemini to become the company’s “next app to reach 500 million users.” However, Pichai confirmed that there will be some challenges ahead and expected “some flip-flops.” Ultimately, Pichai believes Gemini can lead the industry, saying “Historically, you don’t always need to be number one, but you have to execute well and truly be the best in its category.”
Since then, DeepMind co-founder Demis Hassabis has claimed that “the product itself will evolve tremendously over the next year or two.” Hassabis went on to propose a goal of “a universal assistant that can operate seamlessly in any domain, in any mode, or on any device.”
If you’re wondering where Project Astra fits into all this, Hassabis said it “will be updated in the first half of this year.” In early December, Google allowed registration for a “trusted tester waitlist,” but the floodgates haven’t opened yet.
As if the pressure from various government agencies wasn’t enough, Google is also feeling the pressure from OpenAI. The AI giant recently concluded its “12 Days of Releases,” which introduced a variety of new features. Arguably the biggest of them all is Sora, which allows you to build AI-generated movies using just text prompts.
Not only that, but OpenAI also announced some major improvements to ChatGPT search, apparently putting Google in its sights. Not to be outdone, OpenAI launched the o3 and o3 mini artificial intelligence models, which are said to be substantial improvements over the previous o1 and o1 mini models.
However, OpenAI also recently launched ChatGPT Pro, a new subscription priced at $200 per month. Once you register, you will receive the “highest level of access,” including unlimited access to GPT-4o, o1, and Advanced Voice.
This is an area of concern for everyone even remotely interested in the future of artificial intelligence, including whether Google plans to charge a similar price for access to Gemini. Hassabis reportedly responded at the meeting: “Currently, we don’t have any plans for this subscription level.” Of course, there’s nothing to say that won’t change tomorrow, but if you have concerns, it It does provide a little relief.
Providing a roadmap for what is expected to be achieved by 2025 is only a small part of the story. What’s more important is persisting, reaching or even exceeding these goals. Needless to say, it will be interesting to see how everything develops over the next 12 months.