Google slashed its cloud computing service prices on Tuesday as the company is trying to compete with Amazon.com and Microsoft. Google's Cloud Storage will cost 2.6 cents per gigabyte, about 68 percent lower for most customers. Google's Compute Engine services will cost 32 percent less across all sizes, regions and classes.

"The cost of virtualized hardware should fall in line with the cost of the underlying real hardware," Google Senior Vice President Urs Holzle said in a post on Google's official developers blog on Tuesday.

Holzle added that hardware costs have improved by 20 to 30 percent during the past five years but that "public cloud prices fell at just 8 percent per year."

Companies are often using computers owned and operated by the likes of Amazon and Google instead of buying the equipment themselves.

Amazon Web Services provide the underlying infrastructure for key aspects of popular Web companies such as online movie streaming service Netflix Inc and social network Pinterest.

Earlier this week Cisco also announced plans to spend $1 billion over the next two years to build a new cloud services business.