Google Is Painting A Big Fat Target On Dropbox

Google is getting close to launching Drive, an online storage service that would compete with Dropbox and Microsoft's SkyDrive.

That's according to Amir Efrati of the Wall Street Journal, who reports that the service will launch in "weeks or months."

Google Drive will let users store photos, documents, and videos, then access them from any device with a Web connection, including smartphones.

It will also make it easier to share huge files -- instead of attaching a file to an email message, users will simply send links to the file, which will be automatically stored in Drive. This is almost identical to how Microsoft SkyDrive works with Hotmail.

Google will aim to undercut Dropbox on price, says the report, and will make Drive free to most consumers and businesses except for those who need a ton of storage. Dropbox is free up to 2GB, while SkyDrive is free up to 25GB*.

Drive will also be tied into Google Apps, and could eventually evolve into a collaboration and storage service similar to Box.net.

Google was close to launching a similar service called G Drive way back in 2007, but killed it because it "sucked," according to MG Siegler, who followed the initiative when he was reporting for TechCrunch.

*Update: Corrected the amount of storage offered by SkyDrive. It used to be 5GB, but was increased to 25GB back in 2008.

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