We’ve gone to great lengths to build it around an online application experience. We want this to be about creating and collaborating — and your data is there for you. I think others have taken a file/data approach, and saying you have [access to] that everywhere. It’s nuanced, but I think it’s very different.
Google SVP Sundar Pichai explaining to AllThingsD why Google Drive isn’t competing with Dropbox.
This reminded me of something I read recently (that I now can’t find anywhere, so maybe I’m making it up) about the concept of product development and Leapfrogging. Google hasn’t just launched a me-too product, but taken consumer/SMB cloud storage a step beyond the existing providers, providing an integrated data and collaboration platform. Sure, lookout Dropbox and Box.net, but I think also, lookout Singly.
On a separate note, when was the last time that Google launched something with partners in place?
Pete's blog 
I would agree with you about the leapfrog thing if GDrive synced actual Google Document files. But it doesn’t. As far Google Docs goes it syncs a tiny JSON string with a link in it to the doc.
If it had synced the actual document that would have been a huge step forward. No more funky backup services, just let GDrive do it. I’m disappointed.
I was thinking less about Google Docs and more the integrations with other services. Having a ‘data’ store vs a ‘file’ store seems to make a lot of sense to me, although I agree that so far it looks, well, more like a link-to-file store (at least as far as Docs is concerned).