The urban existence relies heavily on the Internet. We spend hours on our smartphones performing meaningful and sometimes meaningless tasks. Among all this, what has become a modern day essential is, ‘why don’t you google it?’ ‘To google’ is a standard entry in the new-age lexicon, and a vital part of our everyday lives.
Started as a research project in March 1996 by Larry Page and Sergery Bin, Google has gone on to become one of the world’s leading search engines. With the launch almost coinciding with a major economic meltdown, Google can be viewed as an example of how economic shocks create opportunities for new ideas propelling innovation and growth.
A classic tale of entrepreneurship, hard work and some luck, the company had humble beginnings. However, it quickly became a popular name in the field of advertising, cloud computing, and software and hardware solutions.
Conception:
After having worked on Stanford University’s servers for more than a year, the search engine moved out and registered itself as Google in September 1997. With AndyBechtolsheim’s (co-founder of Sun Microsystems) $100,000 check, Google started its first office out of a friend’s garage in Menlo Park, California.
Strong, Stronger, Strongest!
The turn of the century witnessed Google taking off on a jet plane, quite literally! Having been turned down by the erstwhile Internet giant, Yahoo, the new search engine went from strength to strength launching products and services, left, right center. It’s rise to dominance comprised several partnerships, acquisitions, philanthropic initiatives, etc.
A subsidiary of the holding company Alphabet, Inc., Google offers over 50 Internet services and products. These include Gmail, Google Docs, Google Drive, Google Maps, YouTube, Chrome, etc. The company’s rather broad product portfolio and size puts it as one of the top four influential companies in the high-tech industry. A tech-giant named alongside Amazon, Apple, IBM, and Microsoft, its original search tool remains the core of its success despite the variety of product offerings. Some of Google’s products have more than 1 billion users each!
Google Ventures
Apart from reshaping the modern internet and life, in general, Google has been offering financial support to entrepreneurs since 2009. Started as Google Ventures (now officially known as GV), the company works independently from Google and offers seed, venture and growth stage funding to startup companies across several fields. These include software, and hardware, healthcare, life science, artificial intelligence, transportation, cyber security and agriculture, and the Internet.
Google Cloud
One of the leading cloud computing services in the world, the popularity of Google Cloud Platform (GCP) can be gauged via a recent study by IDC. With cloud technology becoming increasingly critical for businesses to embark on the digital transformation journey and be future ready, the GCP has been offering a thriving and significantly growing economic benefit for its partners across the world.
Google & Covid-19
Right from the start of the current pandemic, the tech-giant has displayed its rather humane side on several fronts. The company has offered community, employee, and technology support in various geographies and continues to do so.
From humble beginnings to staggeringly influential runs, Google enjoys a monopoly over how more than a billion people through the world search the repository of human knowledge, perform work, communicate, consume media, and maneuver the bottomless world of the Internet.
