Google hit double digits last Sept. 7. Although, the Internet king is still considered a baby in the corporate world, but its phenomenal growth makes its 10th birthday a milestone.
But Google's phenomenal growth wasn't part of a calculated plan. Back in 1998, Stanford alumni Larry Page and Sergey Brin just happened to take an interest in organizing information on the Internet, and they founded and worked on Google in a friend's garage in Menlo Park, California. Moreso, their first internet server was housed in Lego bricks. But who would thought that such a poor start-up is now a very rich venture?
Soon after Google started its very promising online career, its formula of combining web searches with advertising services made the company an Internet blockbuster. The number of web searches it handles nowadays has grown astronomically to 235-million searches a day as of July this year, according to estimates by research group comScore. No wonder, it turns web searches into cash to the tune of US$16.5-billion in annual revenues.
Since going public, the company has used its huge funds to acquire a slew of innovative stuffs like photo-sharing service Picasa, video site YouTube, and Google Earth mapping service. It also has ventured into some consumer services such as Gmail e-mail service and Orkut social networking site. Last year, the company's stock price shot past US$700 per share and has since fallen back to US$450 per share. Its market capital is currently at US$142-billion.
However, in spite of those several reasons to celebrate, the company says it has never partied on its birthday and doesn't plan to start now. So, better luck next time Google guys!
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