5 new features from Google Cloud Next ‘26 that will transform your organisation
Another year, the Luce IT team has landed in the Nevada desert to attend Google Cloud Next ‘26 in Las Vegas. And we don’t just do it for the lights or the show; we go because it’s the place where the direction of technology is decided.
This year, on the flight back, the team’s feeling was unanimous: artificial intelligence has matured. We are no longer in that phase of “look how well it writes this poem” or “how funny this image is”. What Google has shown us is that AI has gone from being a talking assistant to being an acting agent.
At Luce IT, we were thrilled to see that the solutions we are already implementing with our clients are heading down the exact same path proposed by the giants. We are aligned, and that gives us the confidence of knowing that we are offering you the latest of the latest.
5 New Announcements from Google Cloud Next ‘26
After intense days of presentations and chats with Google engineers, we have selected the five innovations that we believe will mark a before and after in the way we work. Here we explain them to you simply:
1. Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform: The new AI headquarters
Google has taken a giant step by unifying all its artificial intelligence tools under a single name: Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform. What we previously knew as Vertex AI is now part of this much more complete and easier-to-manage ecosystem.
- What is it? It is a unified platform where technical teams can create, scale, and monitor their AI agents.
- Why should you care? Because it eliminates fragmentation. You no longer have a thousand loose pieces; you now have a professional environment designed to take agents out of the “lab” and put them to work at the core of your business safely.
- The extra touch: They have included a new “Agent Development Kit” (ADK) that allows these tools to be much more powerful and easier to integrate with what you already use today.
2. Agentic Data Cloud: Data with “superpowers”
At Luce IT, we always say that AI is just the engine, but data is the fuel. Google has introduced the Agentic Data Cloud, an evolution that makes your data cease to be a passive archive and become the basis for action.
- Clearer names: So that we all understand each other better, they have simplified the names of their products. For example, BigLake is now Lakehouse and Dataplex is Knowledge Catalog.
- Intelligent context: Thanks to the new Knowledge Catalog, the AI doesn’t have to “guess”. It extracts the real meaning of your data (whether PDF documents or applications like SAP) so that agents act with total precision.
- Cost savings: By using “Lakehouse” architectures, unnecessary data copies are eliminated, which reduces infrastructure costs and accelerates results.
3. 8th Generation TPUs: The muscle behind the intelligence
For a company to run thousands of agents working at once, brutal computing power is needed. Google has introduced its new TPU v8 systems (specifically the TPU 8t and the TPU 8i).
- TPU 8t for learning: It is designed to train massive models in record time, reducing timelines from months to weeks.
- TPU 8i for acting: This is the one that really excites us for the day-to-day. It is the “reasoning” engine. It eliminates the data bottlenecks that sometimes make AI slow, allowing responses and actions to be almost instantaneous.
- Efficiency: It is not only faster, but it offers a price/performance ratio 2.7 times better than the previous generation.
4. Workspace Intelligence: Your new teammate
Artificial intelligence has stopped being something you “visit” on a website to become integrated into your email, your documents, and your chats through Workspace Intelligence.
- It understands your world: The system now comprehends the complex relationships of your work: your active projects, your collaborators, and your writing style.
- Ask Gemini in Google Chat: Imagine having a unified controller. You can ask Gemini for a daily summary of your pending tasks, to search for information in Salesforce, or to schedule a meeting by analyzing the whole team’s agenda for you.
- Direct action: In tools like Sheets, you can now create mini-applications or interactive dashboards using just natural language.
5. Agentic SOC: Security that defends itself
With AI agents working everywhere, security has to be just as fast. Google has introduced the Agentic SOC, a system that uses several agents working as a team to protect your company.
- Autonomous defense: These agents are trained with the expertise of the best analysts from Google and Mandiant. They are capable of observing, reasoning, and acting on a threat before a human can even detect it.
- Identity for agents: Now each AI agent has its own “secure identity” (IAM), which allows knowing exactly what each one has done and ensures there is always a clear trail for audits.
- Goodbye to the heavy lifting: This allows your security team to focus on what’s important, while the AI takes care of tripling the response speed to potential incidents.
A simpler and more human future
What we have seen in Las Vegas is not science fiction; it is a technology designed to make our lives easier. At Luce IT we are convinced that the future is not about machines replacing people, but about people with “superpowers” thanks to agents that take care of the routine so that we can focus on the creative and strategic.
At Luce IT we help you lead this transformation towards the agentic enterprise through our solutions, ensuring your intelligent agents have the best database and the intelligence necessary to truly automate your processes. Do you want to know more about how to apply these Google Cloud novelties in your organization? Get in touch with us.
Frequently Asked Questions about Google Cloud Next 2026
What was discussed at Google Cloud Next 2026?
The central theme was “The Agentic Enterprise at Scale”. The event focused on how artificial intelligence has gone from being a query tool to being a system of “agents” capable of executing actions, reasoning through processes, and automating complete workflows in companies.
What is the new Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform?
It is the unified evolution of Google Cloud’s AI tools (including what used to be Vertex AI). This platform allows technical teams to create, deploy, and govern AI agents in a single environment, making it easy for these agents to connect securely with company data and applications.
Why has Google changed the names of products like BigLake or Dataplex?
Under the new Agentic Data Cloud concept, Google has sought more descriptive names to facilitate their adoption. BigLake is now Lakehouse and Dataplex has evolved into Knowledge Catalog. The goal is for data to be easier to manage so that it serves as direct “context” for the new AI agents.
What real advantages do the new TPUs v8 presented at Next ’26 bring?
The TPUs v8 (models 8t and 8i) are designed for the era of agents. The TPU 8i, specifically, improves the AI’s “reasoning” speed, allowing agents’ responses and actions to be almost instantaneous, with a performance-per-dollar efficiency almost three times higher than the previous generation.
How does Workspace Intelligence affect my daily work in Google Workspace?
It transforms the tools you already use (Gmail, Drive, Docs) into an intelligent ecosystem. Thanks to agentic AI, you can now ask for meeting summaries, automate the creation of reports in Sheets, or have an agent manage your calendar and emails, understanding the context of your current projects without you having to search for the information manually.
