Spotify is a BIG Google Cloud customer with a $450 million commit back in 2018 [0, 1, 2]. Companies want to keep these types of customers obviously and will leverage other teams internally to get a value add to get that renewal. This is likely just another integration as they look to leverage the relationship across bizdev, partner marketing, and sales teams, internal engineering dogfood projects, discounts, etc. Lots of this type of stuff isn't even targeted at competition just an evolution of the relationship.
Normally how this type of stuff happens, is you'll have some internal team working on a new initiative and looking for headline customers, they will reach out to the sales teams, and say, "hey, you are working with XYZ customer, want to float this idea with them". It's a win-win.
So, having said all they. Google vs Apple, etc, and other large competition politics almost never are on the radar of these teams. They just want to help the customer win, get the sales commissions, and make their internal product successful. It's easy to look at this stuff from the outside and think there is some big plan but the motivation down at the teams level has nothing to do with that since they want mostly to look good on perf reviews.
I have no knowledge of the internals here just talking from experience from what I've seen.
[0] https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/20/spotify-will-spend-nearly-45...
[1] https://www.protocol.com/enterprise/spotify-google-cloud-pla...
[2] https://cloud.google.com/customers/spotify
Note: I originally had Shopify here. The same strategy/tactics apply.
Normally how this type of stuff happens, is you'll have some internal team working on a new initiative and looking for headline customers, they will reach out to the sales teams, and say, "hey, you are working with XYZ customer, want to float this idea with them". It's a win-win.
So, having said all they. Google vs Apple, etc, and other large competition politics almost never are on the radar of these teams. They just want to help the customer win, get the sales commissions, and make their internal product successful. It's easy to look at this stuff from the outside and think there is some big plan but the motivation down at the teams level has nothing to do with that since they want mostly to look good on perf reviews.
I have no knowledge of the internals here just talking from experience from what I've seen.
[0] https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/20/spotify-will-spend-nearly-45...
[1] https://www.protocol.com/enterprise/spotify-google-cloud-pla...
[2] https://cloud.google.com/customers/spotify
Note: I originally had Shopify here. The same strategy/tactics apply.