Back in January 2010, we published “The Path to Google’s World Domination Is Covered in Free Applications”. Truth be told, it was simple curiosity leading us to write the post: “Google World Domination” is based around a prediction that Google will run the world by 2014. There’s even a countdown to “doomsday”. When you read the page and watch the video, it seems like a conspiracy theory. We wanted to see where it was going and started clicking links.”
Recently, Google acquired Motorola Mobility – Motorola’s Mobile Devices division until January 2011. Of course, there’s a big paragraph at the bottom full of legalize about “forward-looking statements” in true Google CYA manner.
Anyway, this acquisition once again caught our attention. –And, once again, we decided to delve into the path of Google’s world domination. How close are they getting? What do they own now? What’s changed?
Google Is a BIG Company
At the time of this writing, Google Inc. (GOOG) stock closed at $563.77 per share. That’s more than Apple (AAPL), at $376.99, and definitely more than Microsoft (MSFT), which closed at $25.10.
Among a huge list of other things, Google owns:
- At least 75 offices in 43 countries
- Approximately 900,000 servers
- 2 operating systems (Android and Chrome OS)
- A public DNS resolution service
- 12+ advertising-based products, including DoubleClick, AdWords and Click-to-Call
- 26 Facebook pages
- 45+ YouTube channels
- Way more Twitter accounts than one company should ever need
- 187 patents by 2008; 316 patents, two years later (a good Google patent list here)
- An additional 1,029 patents, bought from IBM in July 2011, with more to come once the Motorola deal is finalized
- 70 charging stations for electric cars
- Google Energy, an all-Google electric utility, which has the power to sell energy, capacity and services
- It’s own suite of office products, such as Google Docs (free) and Google Apps (business) – by the way, Google Apps is also Google’s own cloud service
- An eBook store
- A social network (of course)
- A paid/free website creator/hosting provider (think WordPress.com, Typepad, etc)
- Google One Pass (Associated Content, anyone?)
- Over 100 products, including Chromebook, Android, Chrome Web Browser, Google Desktop and Picasa (desktop and online photo editing software)
- Free, WiFi service (Mountain View only)
- An entire city block of Manhattan
- A fiber optic network
- A philanthropic section
- A venture capital investment section
- 30 acres in the small city of The Dalles, Oregon aka “Googleville”
As if that wasn’t enough, Google also provides services to the U.S. Government, such as a souped up Google Earth contracted to the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (built by the CIA and Defense Department). In fact, they’ve been in the government contracts business since 2009/2010.
Investments and Acquisitions – Google Pies
How many pies does Google have its fingers in? How many investments have they made? Since the beginning of 2001, Google has either bought or invested in over 100 services, companies and divisions.
For example, Android Inc was originally the brainchild of Andy Rubin, Rich Miner, Nick Sears andChris White. Google liked the look of the operating system and brought it into the fold – along with Rubin, Miner and White. In fact, Rubin is currently the Senior Vice President ofMobileat Google.
Picasa, a desktop application for photo editing/sharing, was a 2004 acquisition. At the time, it was meant to be used with Blogger. The online version, Picasa Web Albums, is now integrated with Google + as a way to instant upload and share photos.
Google Maps was built with the help of at least 6 different technology acquisitions, from four countries.
Google Ventures investments cover such things as payment services, online marketplaces, the development of negative and carbon neutral fuels, anti-malware technology, vacation rentals, crowd sourced legal answers, fuel efficient cars… they’ve even invested in HubSpot (get the full list of Google Ventures investments).
So what pies does Google have its fingers in? Among the list is:
- Mobile phone software (Android)
- Smartphone creation (Nexus)
- Advertising
- Search
- Community grants
- Government application/contracts
- Imaging software
- Website development
- Green energy development
- Payment processing
- Social Networking (Google +, etc.)
- Video sharing
- Business/Enterprise applications
- Office software
- Web and social analytics software
- Cloud computing
- Blogging software
- 3D Modeling
- Online security
Is Google really aiming for world domination?
As the year 2014 draws closer (the year outlined in the original video), it definitely seems more possible. Who knows where they’re going next? Only Google, but you can be sure it’ll be something fantastic and, most likely, out of their expected sphere of influence.
11 Responses
I had no idea Google have these many investments not until i came across with this post. Great! Very informative and yeah, it would seem that Google would as if aim for world domination (I hope not!).
Hi there. Really a nice post and good information of Google. Thanks for sharing it.
One time i had a face to face talk with a demon. He said he works for google nowadays.
LOL Joe, yeah I wonder how many “demons” there are out there? 😉 Thanks for the laugh.
May be it is possible that Google will take over the important properties of the world but little bit I fell like 2012 will be turning time for Google because other search engines like Bing and yahoo is trying to expand their business through joining business with other popular platforms like facebook.
I really don’t want to violate the comment guidelines but, due to the nature of this article, here it goes. Think about how much Google has in its influence over businesses all over the world. People in my industry (personal injury lawyers) compete on a large level for rank in search engines. These folks use keywords like personal injury lawyer Houston (plug! forgive me!) and work earnestly to mindlessly spread their influence across the internet for a few coveted spots on the top of these lists. For our firm, it’s absolutely vital for us to survive by keeping Google in our sights. World takeover? Already happened.
Well, I’ve always thought that the Google Search Engine would eventually become “self-aware”, spawning a terminator-like subjugation of the human race. Then the only answers to anyone’s questions would be Google’s answers… Wait… that’s pretty much true now 🙂
That said, from a market cap perspective, Google is still behind Apple and Mr Softee:
AAPL: 330.07B
MSFT: 201.50B
GOOG: 158.51B
These figures from Yahoo Finance.
And I’m not worried about Google taking over government roles. Any change to government would be an improvement. I’ll take PhDs in mathematics over a bunch of attorneys any day … 😉
I hear you, even though I’m not sure about the Google engineers either lolol I’ve been reading “I’m Feeling Lucky” by Employee #59 Douglas Edwards. I’m still surprised at how many people really don’t have a clue about Google’s global holdings. AAPL is rock star no other way around it! Love my
It wouldn’t surprise me at all if they did ‘take over the world’. Already, when you mention a search engine, the very first that anyone will think of will be Google. Like Apple for example, they continue to develop new ideas and make vast acquisitions. It’s for this reason both their stock prices continue to rise, that they are able to continue to dip into the unknown and that they will keep building as companies. I wasn’t aware of Google’s government roles, however again, this only goes to show the level of their continued influence across various platforms. Will they completely ‘take over’ by 2014, probably not, but they will certainly make huge leaps towards a full integration into our lives by that point.
Hey David, 2014 we should huddle and exchange notes…. 😉 I was pretty shocked when I found out they were taking over government roles, at least ones that they could discuss. I wonder how much more they don’t tell us about?
Indeed! The government roles over anything else is what really surprised me too. It’s all well and good them acquiring other businesses and expanding their influence over various fields and sectors in the world, but actually being integral in the running of our countries!?! It’s partially worrying but also incredibly interesting. Like you said, come 2014, it’ll be fascinating to see where they are in terms of influence and what level of expansion and growth they’ve had.