What Is Google’s ‘Alphabet’? An Explanation

Yesterday, Google announced it’s no longer Google. Google is now a part of a company called Alphabet. It’s very confusing! Let us explain!

So, wait. Somebody bought out Google?

Nope. Google has decided that all of Google, which is a huge company, should be part of an even bigger company, which is called, you guessed it, Alphabet. On the financial end of things, this means all your Google shares are now Alphabet shares, and that Google is promoting somebody else to CEO so Larry Page and Sergey Brin can focus on running Alphabet.

What other businesses is Alphabet running?

Essentially, Alphabet is being used to separate a few of Google’s… weirder ideas from the part of the company that actually makes cash. One example Larry Page used in his announcement is Calico, Google’s bid to create immortality. But this is also a company that, for example, owns YouTube, one of the biggest sites on the Internet, and is working on autonomous cars, all-terrain robots, and God knows what else. So, turning those into their own companies will probably be a good thing.

He didn’t really say “G is for Google,” did he?

He did.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing for Google?

It’s a good thing in the sense that Google can be more focused on the stuff you actually use, like Google Maps, and less on the stuff nobody cares about, like its many failed social networks. It may be a bad thing in the sense that Google’s founders will now be managing a whole bunch of companies instead of just one company doing a whole bunch of things. Their focus will be split.

But your day-to-day probably won’t be affected. Mostly, it just means you’ll need to fiddle with your stock ticker if you own Google shares.

One more thing, why did he choose a name that’s terrible for SEO?

Hey, even Google makes mistakes.

(Via Googleblog)

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