Google and NASA?

Based on an article in Mercury News, Google is teaming up with NASA to make a new research campus. It seems like an unlikely duo, but I can see how Google's technology can help NASA in "space age" technology. I'm not quite sure how Google benefits from this, except that it will probably receive a lot of goodwill to its name. Maybe Google just has too much cash to sit on and is trying to figure out useful investments. Microsoft has billions of dollars of cash on hand. It's not very useful to the company when it isn't employed in making more money. I think that Google is making a wise investment. It will help the company in some way.