I wish I had reasonable evidence to point to, but I'm not really an insider. Mainly, I think of the numerous applications Google invested lots of engineer time

I wish I had reasonable evidence to point to, but I'm not really an insider. Mainly, I think of the numerous applications Google invested lots of engineer time into to create an experience, say Hangouts, only to realize that it hampered sales in another corner of Google, say cell plans, and so one project must be discarded for profits in the other. The functionality is often difficult to replace for the end-user, and weakens the overall allure of the Google network/ecosystem of applications in favor of a bottom-line.