# Google

> The search company that gives most products away and makes its money on ads.

- Level: Basic
- Topics: Tech companies, AI
- URL: https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/google/
- In Spanish: [Google](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/es/google/)

**Google** started in 1998 as a search engine built by two Stanford students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin. Their idea was to rank web pages by how many other pages linked to them, which gave much better results than the search engines of the time. Since 2015 Google is part of **Alphabet**, a parent company that also holds other bets such as Waymo, the self-driving car business.

Most people never pay Google directly, and yet it is one of the largest companies in the world. The trick is **advertising**: Search, YouTube, Maps, Gmail, Chrome and Android are free, billions of people use them every day, and businesses pay to show ads next to what those people search for or watch. Because a search says exactly what someone wants right now ('plumber near me'), those ads are unusually valuable, and ads still bring in most of the company's revenue.

On top of that it sells things directly. **Google Cloud** rents computing, storage and data tools to companies, competing with AWS and Microsoft Azure. Google DeepMind, its AI lab, builds the **Gemini** models, and Google designs its own AI chips, called TPUs. It also sells Pixel phones and other devices, and takes a share of the sales in the Play Store, the app store of Android.

## An analogy

A free TV channel. The shows (search, video, maps) cost you nothing because the channel sells the commercial breaks to advertisers, and the more people watch, the more each break is worth.

## Keep in mind

- Founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin; part of Alphabet since 2015.
- Most of its revenue comes from ads shown in Search, YouTube and partner sites.
- Android, Chrome, Gmail and Maps are free and keep people inside its ecosystem.
- It also sells Google Cloud, Gemini models and Pixel devices.

## Go deeper

- [About Google](https://about.google/)
- [Google products](https://about.google/products/)
- [Google on Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google)

## Related terms

- [Google Cloud](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/google-cloud/): Google's cloud business: computing, storage, data and AI services rented by the hour.
- [Microsoft](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/microsoft/): The company of Windows and Office, now just as much a cloud company with Azure.
- [Artificial intelligence](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/artificial-intelligence/): Getting computers to do things that, until recently, only people could do.
- [Gemini](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/gemini/): Google's family of AI models, and the assistant app that carries the same name.
- [Chip](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/semiconductor-chip/): A sliver of silicon carrying billions of tiny switches that compute and remember.
- [TPU](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/tpu/): Google's chip designed specifically for the math of neural networks.