Google unveils Google Kubernetes Engine updates with a big focus on AI.
Everyone and their dog is investing in AI, but Google has more reason than most to put serious effort into its offerings. As Google CEO Sundar Pichai said in an internal meeting before last year’s holidays: “In 2025, we need to be relentlessly focused on unlocking the benefits of [AI] technology and solve real user problems.”
To help realize that vision, at the Google Cloud Next 2025 event in Las Vegas, Google announced substantial advancements in its Kubernetes and Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) offerings. These advances aim to empower platform teams and developers to succeed with AI while leveraging their existing Kubernetes skills.
Indeed, Gabe Monroy, Google’s VP of Cloud Runtimes, said: “Your Kubernetes skills and investments aren’t just relevant; they’re your AI superpower.”
So, what are those new advances? Let’s take a detailed look at the features.
Simplified AI Cluster Management: GKE will offer simplified AI cluster management through tools like Cluster Director for GKE, formerly Hypercompute Cluster. This advance enables users to deploy and manage large virtual machines (VMs) clusters with attached Nvidia GPUs. This feature is particularly beneficial for scaling AI workloads efficiently.
A related service that’s on its way is Cluster Director for Slurm. Slurm is an open-source job Linux scheduler and workload manager. The tool manages clusters and schedules jobs for high-performance computing. Google will use a simplified UI and APIs to provision and operate Slurm clusters, including blueprints for typical workloads with pre-configured software to make deployments reliable and repeatable.
Optimized AI Model Deployment: The platform provides optimized AI model deployment capabilities, including the GKE Inference Quickstart and GKE Inference Gateway. These tools simplify the infrastructure selection and deployment of AI models, ensuring benchmarked performance characteristics and intelligent load balancing.
