Google LLC today announced the beta launch of Tables, an experimental project tracking service that could create more competition for category leaders such Asana, Airtable and Trello.

The service is the brainchild of Area120, a unit inside the search giant responsible for testing new product ideas.

Tables allows workers to organize all the tasks related to a given project in a virtual white board. Each task is displayed in a separate box on this whiteboard. Users can view a description of the task, whether it has been completed or not, and other information such as which colleague has been assigned to perform it.

Area120’s engineers have also thrown in more advanced features to make users’ day-to-day interactions with Tables smoother. There’s a set of automations for handling repetitive tasks such as sending workers email notifications when they’re assigned a new task. Workers can customize how tasks are displayed in Tables by selecting one of the several supported interface Tables and add attachments when needed, for instance when the to-do item in question is to update a business document.

Google has been testing Tables with early adopters prior to today’s beta launch. Current users of the service include staff members at the Wyoming State Construction Department, National Geographic and technology consulting firm Atrium AI, among others.

Tables comes in a free version and a paid version priced at $10 per user per month that adds extra features such as support for larger attachments. In the future, it may make sense for Google to make the paid version available at no extra charge to customers of its G Suite productivity toolkit. However, it wouldn’t be too surprising if Google continues offering the service as a separate subscription given the potential revenue opportunities. 

Enterprises are showing a growing willingness not only to use but also to pay for project tracking tools that can help their workers keep track of outstanding tasks. Asana Inc., the startup behind one of the most popular tools in this category, reported revenues of $142.6 million in its 2020 fiscal year. That’s compared with $76.8 million during the previous 12 months.

Google’s big edge over more established project tracking tools is G Suite. Tables has several integrations with G Suite on launch that could make it appealing for enterprise customers who already use the productivity toolkit. That’s especially true if Google strengthens these integrations over time, for example by letting users pull up Google Docs files directly inside the Tables interface when they’re assigned a task that involves updating a document.

Images: Google