Currently, voting power is extremely concentrated in the hands of the founders. Larry and Sergey together own 51% of the voting power, thanks in large part to their Class B shares. That power gives them the ability to direct Alphabet’s long-term strategy without bowing to short-term market forces. Each share has 10 votes, which has allowed them to maintain significant control over the company’s direction.
From Stanford to Silicon Valley
- Sundar Pichai, Alphabet Inc’s top shareholder after co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, owns 88,693 shares in the company, representing 0.01% of all outstanding shares.
- This allowed the various departments that weren’t directly related to Google’s main Internet services to spin off into their own subcompanies within the same business umbrella.
- Today, YouTube’s ownership landscape is far more complex, with stakeholders ranging from Google’s parent company, Alphabet Inc., to individual content creators and advertisers who invest their time and resources into the platform.
- The sale of $1.67 billion gave Google a market capitalization of more than $23 billion.
- This means Class B shares cannot be inherited without losing their extra voting powers.
Google’s story began in 1998 when Larry Page and Sergey Brin, two Ph.D. students at Stanford University, embarked on a mission to organize the vast amount of information available on the internet. They developed a revolutionary search engine algorithm, laying the foundation for what would become Google. The company was officially founded on September 4, 1998, in a humble garage in Menlo Park, California.
List of former board chairs
While Larry Page and Sergey Brin remain influential as co-founders and major shareholders, Google is now a publicly traded company owned by its stockholders. While Google remains Alphabet’s largest and most profitable subsidiary, the parent company has its fingers in many pies. From self-driving cars (Waymo) to life sciences research (Verily), Alphabet is pushing the boundaries of technology and innovation. This diversification helps spread risk and opens up new avenues for growth beyond Google’s core search and advertising business.
Who Owns YouTube: History and Timeline of Events
Since 2007,update Google has aimed for carbon neutrality in regard to its operations. In Spring 2009, Google hired a herd of 200 goats for a week from California Grazing to mow their lawn. There is no official data on the number of servers in Google data centers; however, research and advisory firm Gartner estimated in a July 2016 report that Google at the time had 2.5 million servers.
- With that, Alphabet Inc. took its place as one of the world’s most powerful companies.
- In 2023 Google consumed 24 TWh of electricity, more than countries such as Iceland, Ghana, the Dominican Republic, or Tunisia.
- As you’ve learned, Google’s ownership structure is complex, with Alphabet Inc. serving as the parent company.
- It was created in 2015 as a way to reorganize Google’s rapidly expanding collection of companies and initiatives.
- Class C shares, frequently issued to employees as part of compensation or sold to generate capital, lack voting rights.
Google’s mission is “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” With a dedication to educational excellence, I strive to keep our candidates abreast of the latest developments and trends in current affairs. By providing insightful and engaging content, I aim to ensure that aspiring candidates are well-prepared and informed for their examinations. Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the co-founders of Google, wield profound influence in the realms of technology and the internet. These visionary minds not only transformed information retrieval but laid the foundation for innovations that have shaped the digital era.
On the list of largest technology companies by revenue, it pays the lowest taxes to the countries of origin of its revenues. Google between 2007 and 2010 saved $3.1 billion in taxes by shuttling non-U.S. Tax rate to 2.3 per cent, while normally the corporate tax rate in, for instance, the UK is 28 per cent.
What started as a student project in a Stanford garage has grown into a global empire. It’s all right if the answer is “no.” With more than 260 completed acquisitions in April 2025 (including three in the last year alone), it’s hard to keep up with this tech giant’s wheeling and dealing. With a background in journalism, Ben believes the best content tells a story, and he’s always looking for new ways to share that story with the world. Outside of work, Ben spends his time watching Netflix or searching for the best coffee spots in town. Major shifts typically occur through stock market transactions or internal decisions like issuing new shares or altering share classes.
This duo met in 1995 while working on a research project on the World Wide Web (WWW). Within a year after they met, in 1996, they began working on a new search engine called BackRub, which they later renamed to Google. Let’s explore Google’s beginnings, what its founders wanted to do, important moments in its history, and the new things it’s trying, all of which change and redefine how we use the internet. Because it is not just a search engine; it is a huge tech company that plays a big role in our online lives. Since its launch, it has not just changed how we find information and use the internet.
While his stake is relatively small, his leadership role gives him significant influence over the company’s operations. Google is owned by its shareholders, including institutional investors, mutual funds, insiders, and individual investors. Its parent company, Alphabet Inc., was created in 2015 to oversee Google and its other ventures.
Together, they own about 14% of its publicly listed shares and control 56% of its stockholder voting power through super-voting stock. In 2015, Google was reorganized as a wholly owned subsidiary of Alphabet Inc. Google is Alphabet’s largest subsidiary and is a holding company for Alphabet’s internet properties and interests. Sundar Pichai was appointed CEO of Google on October 24, 2015, replacing Larry Page, who became the CEO of Alphabet. It has been referred to as “the most powerful company in the world” by the BBC, and is one of the world’s most valuable brands.
It manages both active and passive funds and invests in Class A shares, providing limited voting power. The firm invests primarily through passive index funds, with exposure mostly to Class A shares. Its voting power is proportionate to its share count, and it typically aligns its voting behavior with other institutional firms on governance and ESG issues. Vanguard’s voting power is around 3.3%, making it the most influential institutional investor in shareholder meetings. However, it does not have insider control and plays a passive role, acting on behalf of its fund shareholders.
How did Alphabet Inc. start?
Google Vice-president Matt Brittin testified to the Public Accounts Committee of the UK House of Commons that his UK sales team made no sales and hence owed no sales taxes to the UK. In January 2016, Google reached a settlement with the UK to pay £130m in back taxes plus higher taxes in future. In 2017, Google channeled $22.7 billion from the Netherlands to Bermuda to reduce its tax bill. In 2012, the company ranked 2nd in campaign donations of technology and Internet sections.
John Doerr, who owns 24,290,420 shares (0.2% of Alphabet), are made wealthy through advantageous equity distributions. These shares are more than just ownership — they serve to incentivize long-term commitment and performance. Class A shareholders with non-majority voting power do not have the decision-making supremacy Class B holders continue to wield. Though Class C shareholders do not possess voting rights, they are still rewarded who own google now with financial returns.
Is YouTube part of Alphabet?
Larry Page and Sergey Brin directly control 51.7% of voting power, allowing them to continue to chart Alphabet’s strategic direction. This governance structure protects their long-term vision, keeping it ingrained in the decision-making process—even through potential mergers or acquisitions. This new structure would indeed bring Google and all its subsidiaries together under one roof. This provided each business with more leeway to operate independently while still enjoying the boons of a centralized corporate overseer in the form of the parent company. This new innovation created new expectations for the whole internet and what was possible. Legacy products like Search, YouTube, and Android still bring in the majority of revenue, with Search still powering Alphabet’s bottom line.
As Google evolves, staying informed about its leadership and corporate structure will help you better comprehend its decisions and their potential effects on technology, privacy, and innovation in the years to come. Alphabet was created in 2015 as part of a corporate restructuring of Google. While Alphabet is the parent company and technical “Google owner,” the day-to-day operations of Google are still run by its own CEO and management team.
