Everyone is probably familiar with the Google search engine. But the company Google is much more than that, which very few people know. Here we show you what is behind the name Google.

Google

What is Google?

Google is primarily one Internet search engine of the US subsidiary “Google LLC”. You can reach them on the website www.google.de. Since 1998, Google has grown to become the largest search engine in the world. Google reportedly processes more than two trillion search queries annually (source: intenseo.de). To handle all searches, Google has an estimated 1 billion servers spread all over the world.

The Google logo. (Image source: Google)
The Google logo. (Image source: Google)

But the company “Google LLC” still offers other internet services which in turn were bought up or set up as independent companies. These include, among others:

  • Android as an operating system for smartphones and tablets. Bought out in 2005.
  • YouTube as an internet platform for videos and streaming. Bought out in 2006.
  • DoubleClick as sales of advertising and marketing agencies and online marketing solutions. Now combined with the “Google Analytics 360 Suite”.
  • reCAPTCHA as spam protection for websites, which is intended to recognize whether certain actions are being carried out by a human or a computer program.
  • “Boston Dynamics” as a military robot manufacturer since 2013. The aim is to “develop a ground robot capable of performing complex tasks in a dangerous, devastated environment created by humans.”
  • HTC as a Taiwanese manufacturer of smartphones and tablets. The company has been partially owned by Google since 2017 (some of the developers and HTC patents).
  • Nest Labs as a manufacturer of smart home solutions such as smart cameras, video doorbells, smoke detectors and thermostats. Acquired by Google in 2018.
  • Kagle as an online community for data scientists has been part of Google since 2017. Kaggle focuses on data science and machine learning (see also Web 3.0.
  • tenor as an online GIF search engine used in messengers and apps worldwide. So you can quickly search and send suitable GIFs. Acquired by Google in 2018.

Who owns Google?

“alphabet inc“ is an umbrella company made up of several subsidiaries. This also includes Google as a subsidiary with the correct name “Google LLC”. The “LLC” stands for “Limited Liability Company” and is a legal form in the USA that protects its owners from being personally sued to repay the company’s debts or liabilities. The CEO (Managing Director) of “Google LLC” is Sundar Pichai, who represents the interests of the actual business owners of “Alphabet Inc.”

Since October 2, 2015, “Google LLC” has been restructured as a subsidiary of “Alphabet Inc.” The core business of Internet services retained the Google name.

Google belongs to the umbrella company
Google belongs to the umbrella company “Alphabet”. Isleowen/CC BY-SA 4.0

The History of Google

  • Google was founded on September 4, 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin. The two developed the idea for the search engine as part of an academic research project.
  • One of the main reasons for the success of Google is the so-called PageRank algorithm. In the process, websites are evaluated based on their link structure and weighted against each other. The more links a page received, the higher it appeared in search results.
  • Google describes the company’s goal as “organizing the world’s information and making it universally accessible and useful”. Originally the slogan “Don’t be evil‘, which Google later removed from its code of conduct in 2018.
  • In 2004, Google came along the stock exchange. The stock’s value rose to over $100 a share within a day. Page and Bryn, who each owned about 38 million shares of stock, became multi-billionaires in one fell swoop.
  • In 2006, Google started the project “Google Books“ – the largest collection of digitized books in private hands. In Germany in particular, “Google Docs” has been heavily criticized by writers and publishers for undermining copyright. In the same year, Google took over the world’s largest video portal YouTube.
  • In 2008, Google released the first version of the Android mobile operating system. Android now dominates the market for smartphone operating systems with a share of around 73% (source: extra).
  • Also in 2008, Google launched its own web browser, Google Chrome. Internationally, Chrome is now the most popular browser.
  • Since 2013, Google has also been working on the virtual reality glasses Google Glass.
  • Google has been on since 2015 #3 Most Valuable Company in the World – behind Apple (1st place) and Microsoft (2nd place), (source: finanzen100.de).
  • In 2018, Google removed the slogan “Don’t be evil‘ from its code of conduct.

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Marco Kratzenberg

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