Big Tech falls short in the first salvos of the Q3 earnings cycle • TechCrunch

If you are a believer in the endless concentration of corporate power, the work of major tech companies to extend their reach into all areas of the digital economy must bring you joy. If you are more in favor of upstart companies attacking and bringing to heel incumbent wealth by the (figurative) sword, it’s probably less welcome. Big Tech companies, once they reach a certain scale, often have the wealth and influence to buy, build or bury their smaller competition.

But no matter on which side of the platform wars you stand, the sprawl of the major tech companies means that they regularly off-gas a plethora of statistics that we can use to better understand the world. Given the ever-changing state of the world’s economy this year, the information that Big Tech earnings provide is even more important than usual.

As we noted earlier this week, TechCrunch+ has several questions that we want to be answered during this particular earnings cycle, and yesterday, thanks to Alphabet and Microsoft, we can begin to remedy our own queries. Today, we’re talking through the advertising, enterprise software, cloud and consumer-related inquiries.

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For broad-based looks at how Google etc. and Redmond fared in aggregated numerical terms, head here and here, respectively.