Case Study – Google
External Growth – Buying Youtube.
Google Inc. is a public corporation, specializing in Internet search and online advertising.
The company had 10,674 full-time employees as of December 31, 2006, and is based in
Mountain View, California. Google's mission statement is "to organize the world's
information and make it universally accessible and useful."
Google was co-founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were students at
Stanford University, and the company was first incorporated as a privately held company
on September 7, 1998. Google's venture into the public domain took place in 2004, and
raised almost $1.7 billion in the public stock market. The company grew rapidly since its
IPO, acquiring smaller companies such as Writely, JotSpot, and online video sharing site
YouTube in 2006, and moving into the office software market with the release of its
Google Apps Premium Edition in 2007. Additionally, Google is also involved in many
cooperational partnerships with other corporations, such as NASA, Sun Microsystems,
Time Warner's America Online, and NewsCorp's MySpace.
Like most large corporations, Google's businesses have drawn some controversy, such as
copyright disputes in its book search project, or accusations of censorship of search
results as it works with countries such as France, Germany, and China. Recently, on
March 13, 2007, Viacom filed a US$1 billion lawsuit against Google and YouTube
alleging massive copyright infringement. Additionally, in the post September 11 era,
several governments have raised concerns about the security risks posed by geographic
details provided by Google Earth's satellite imaging.
Google is particularly known for its relaxed corporate culture. Their corporate philosophy
is based on many casual principles including, "You can make money without doing evil",
"You can be serious without a suit," and "Work should be challenging and the challenge
should be fun." This relaxed culture can also be seen externally through their holiday
variations of the Google logo, as well as their various hoaxes and April Fool's Day jokes.
In 2004, they featured Google Lunar (which claimed to feature jobs on the moon), and in
2005, a fictitious brain-boosting drink, termed Google Gulp was announced.
The name "Google" originated from a misspelling of "googol," which refers to 10100 (the
number represented by a 1 followed by one-hundred zeros). Having found its way
increasingly into everyday language, the verb, "google," was added to the Merriam
Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the Oxford English Dictionary in 2006, meaning, "to
use the Google search engine to obtain information on the Internet."
While the company's primary market is in the web content arena, Google has begun to
experiment with other markets, such as radio and print publications. In 2006, Google
announced that it had purchased the radio advertising company dMarc, which provides an
automated system that allows companies to advertise on the radio. This will allow Google
to combine two niche advertising media -- the Internet and radio -- with Google's ability
to laser-focus on the tastes of consumers. Google has also begun an experiment in selling
advertisements from its advertisers in offline newspapers and magazines, with select
advertisements in the Chicago Sun-Times. They have been filling unsold space in the
newspaper that would have normally been used for in-house advertisements.
Various reports have said that Google is planning the release of its own mobile phone,
perhaps a competitor to Apple's iPhone. The project may be a collaboration between
Google and Orange, HTC or Samsung or another manufacturer. However, very little is
known about the project and most of the information available is speculation.
Questions for Consideration
1.
Complete a SWOT analysis of Google Inc.. Points can be taken from the
article or inferred from other secondary research areas.
2.
Is the acquisition of YouTube just the start of Google’s possible buying spree?
Are other small Internet spaces possibly going to be swallowed up by
Google’s deep pockets?
3.
If you were an Internet developer with a great idea and site, would you
welcome Google’s take over or buyout proposition?