For years, the sales pitch for switching a company to ChromeOS had a frustrating asterisk. An IT director would say, “I’d love to move to ChromeOS for the security, speed, and lower cost…” followed by the inevitable “…but we have this one ancient, business-critical Windows app for accounting that we just can’t live without.”

That “one app”—or handful of apps—was the infamous “app gap.” It was the final boss for Google’s enterprise ambitions, the main reason millions of corporate devices remained locked into the Microsoft ecosystem.

Now, Google thinks it has finally found the solution.

After acquiring software virtualization company Cameyo last year, Google has officially relaunched the service as “Cameyo by Google.” It’s a Virtual App Delivery (VAD) solution, and its entire purpose is to bridge that gap, making it not just possible, but easy for Windows-based organizations to migrate over to ChromeOS.

The service allows users to run their legacy Windows apps—yes, even that crusty 10-year-old accounting program or a hefty modern one like AutoCAD—directly in the Chrome browser or, even better, as a Progressive Web App (PWA). This move is a direct attempt to prevent organizations from being perpetually tied to Microsoft’s operating system.

If you’re getting flashbacks to laggy, clunky remote desktop sessions, take a breath. This is where the “Cameyo by Google” approach gets clever.

Google says the new experience is far more efficient than the traditional method of switching between separate virtual desktop environments (known as VDI, or Virtual Desktop Infrastructure). Instead of virtualizing and streaming an entire Windows desktop just to use one program, Cameyo streams only the specific apps you need.

The result? A user on a Chromebook can have a native Google Sheet open in one window while running a fully-featured, virtualized version of desktop Excel right next to it. To the end-user, it just looks like another app on their taskbar.

This seamlessness is the secret sauce. Windows-based programs like Excel and AutoCAD can run side-by-side with Chrome and other web apps, giving businesses the flexibility to use a mix of Microsoft and Google services without the headache.

“For years, the primary blocker for deeper enterprise adoption of ChromeOS has always been the ‘app gap’ — the persistent need to access a few remaining Windows applications within an organization,” Google said in its announcement. “Now, teams can move to a more modern, collaborative productivity suite that was built for the web, and they can still access any specialized Windows apps that their workflows still depend on.”

The integration goes deeper than just a browser tab. Cameyo allows IT admins to “publish” a Windows app directly to a user’s ChromeOS shelf as a PWA.

Imagine a new employee at an engineering firm. Their IT team gives them a new Chromebook. They click the familiar AutoCAD icon on their shelf, and the app launches. They can even open a file from their local “Downloads” folder or Google Drive, work on it, and save it back. They never have to know or care that the app is actually running on a server hundreds of miles away.

This is the experience Google is selling: all the security and manageability of ChromeOS, with none of the app-gap compromises.

But the truly disruptive part of this strategy might be ChromeOS Flex.

The goal isn’t just to encourage organizations to provide new Chromebooks for their teams. The bigger play is to get them to switch their systems to ChromeOS entirely. With ChromeOS Flex, a company can take its existing fleet of aging Windows PCs, install the free ChromeOS Flex to make them fast and secure again, and then use Cameyo to pipe in those few essential Windows apps.

This one-two punch is a powerful financial argument for CFOs: modernize your entire hardware fleet for the cost of a software subscription, rather than a massive (and expensive) hardware refresh.

While Chromebooks can be more affordable than Windows-based hardware, and more apps are shifting to cloud-based platforms, the number of ChromeOS users is still dwarfed by those using Microsoft’s platform.

By acquiring and deeply integrating Cameyo, Google hasn’t just built a tool; it’s built a bridge. It’s a pragmatic admission that the world won’t abandon all Windows apps overnight. But if Google can make the underlying operating system irrelevant by seamlessly streaming the apps that matter, it has a real shot at convincing the business world that the future of computing doesn’t have to run on Windows.