Do the right thing
Alphabet
Tagline
Net Worth
$1,185,000,000,000
Started in (City)
California
Started in (Country)
United States of America
Incorporation Date
02nd December, 2015
Bankruptcy Date
-
Founders
- Larry Page, Sergey Brin
About
Alphabet Inc. is a multinational conglomerate company created on 2nd October 2015. This company was established after the restructuring of google and became the parent company of Google and former subsidiaries of Google. Alphabet Inc. was the company’s attempt to make Google’s business “cleaner and accountable” says Larry Page. Alphabet covers everything from cloud computing, the internet of things, mobile operating systems, artificial intelligence as well as video streaming. The company is headquartered in Mountview California formerly headed by Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin. Later in 2019, Sundar Pichai CEO at Google was also announced to be the CEO of Alphabet Inc. After the resignation of Page and Brin.
Beginning
On 2nd October 2015, Google announced plans to create a new public holding company “Alphabet Inc.” It was created to restructure Google, reorganizing the company was one of the attempts made by Page and Brin to streamline and focus on new ventures and transform Google into a conglomerate. They always had a bigger picture in mind, always wanted to be like General Electric. The establishment of Alphabet Inc was announced with an official blog post on Google blog. Alphabet In.is mostly a collection of companies, the largest of which is google. It became the world’s fourth-largest technology company in revenue and one of the most valuable companies. As Page mentioned in the official announcement it is an attempt to make Google “cleaner and more accountable”, he also said he wanted to improve “the transparency and oversight of what we are doing”, and to allow greater control of unrelated companies. Alphabet Inc provides the company with a safe place to carry out experiments, all the companies under Alphabet Inc will head by a CEO. All the CEOs have to report to Alphabet CEO, this allows them to decide the best course of action without thinking about its effects on the search engine. After the resignation of Larry Page and Sergey Brin co-founders of Google in 2019 the part of CEO was filled in Sundar Pichai who is also the CEO of Google. Sundar Pichai was always said to be the future of Google unofficially in the prior years after 2019 it was made official as he filled in as the CEO.
Road to Success
At the time of reorganization, the company considered Google Inc to the parent company for Alphabet Inc but after further consideration and discussion, the roles were reversed for Alphabet to be the parent company. A formal notice of intent was given to Wall Street to become Alphabet, a technology conglomerate company. This helped the company to grow in various interests like robotics, life sciences, health care, etc. without affecting their core search engine business. GoogleShares were converted to AlphabetShares, changes for the investors were minimal. As soon as it debuted the market; the market capitalization increased by $27.2 billion which made the market cap for Alphabet bigger than Ford and General Motors. It was intended to streamline transparency for the investors; Alphabet proved to the investors that profit can be made even while exploring new markets and ventures. The power was held by two co-founders of the company by keeping the majority of the voting rights without majority shares, this was done so that company shouldn’t part ways with its goals due to pressure from the investors.
The separation between search, Alphabet's main business, and other companies provides the company with a “safe place” to carry out experiments. Each company within the Alphabet umbrella is headed by a CEO, who reports to the Alphabet CEO, who allows the respective head to determine the best course of action without worrying about the effect on the search engine cash cow.
Challenges
Like any other company in the market, Alphabet is bound to face some issues and challenges on the road. Since 2019 Sundar Pichai took over the leadership for Alphabet Inc. The list consists of employees backslash over harmful practices taking place in the company, the federal antitrust investigation, and slowing the ad business. Employees have been fired recently who plan to file a complaint against the company at National Labour Relation Board. Employees have been vocal about their opposition in the company, some attend the shareholder meeting in protest on what the company projects to the outside world and what is currently happening. It has also been brought to notice about the company handling sexual harassment by executives, it is said that the company plans for a censored search engine in China which will help in future drone strikes.
Failures
Loon was a project launched by Alphabet Inc. that promised internet access to everyone with the help of high-altitude balloons. Providing internet access to the still seems far-fetched as the company recently deflated its last high altitude balloon. The announcement of the company wasn’t surprising but still seemed out of the blue, in prior tests and deployments company seemed to have some success but in the later stages, it became clear that universal internet access still requires a lot of work. It is said that sometimes companies don’t realize the weight of their goal until it’s time to shut it down. Loon isn’t considered to be a failure by Alphabet but a step in the right direction to connect the globe.
Achievements
- Second publicly traded company to reach an $800 billion valuation
Subsidies
- Google Nest
- Firebase
- DeepMind
- Calico
- Verily
- YouTube
CEOs
- Sundar Pichai