Can Google ever be a product company?

To be honest, for the most part, companies in general start off with a certain focus and always find it hard to deviate from that focus.

Google, though huge and with lots of reach, has a very strong focus: advertisingm search engines.and consumer information (marketing). It does do other things somewhat successfully (see Android smartphones) but most of what they do is through acquisitions and peripheric integration to their core. Since there are already huge companies taking care of these alternate services or products, they can compete but generally not as efficiently.

That being said, "Can Google be a product company?" The answer is yes.

Will they be as good at it than other large companies whose focus is Product development and delivery. Maybe, but likely no.

Google's huge advantage and wise acquisitions is that all of them connect snuggly with their core business, thus they can leverage their core to enhance any deficiencies in the acquired product or business model and make it work, even though its a bit rickety.

Over time, with further integration and love, these additional products and services seem to integrate nicely into their core service (Google Docs is an example) but it takes time and effort to achieve.

I believe if Google wants it badly enough, they can eventually be a top notch product company. Remember that Google though huge is very young. Will they really want to switch focus or have multiple main focuses?

Not sure but we'll see.