Google makes so much in ad revenue that they don’t care about anything else. They can afford to dabble in hundreds of side projects without feeling any actual pressure to deliver on them.
Eventually, the half-assed commitment leads them to cancel projects, or pivot, or start over from scratch. It’s almost predictable at this point.
So true. If a Google team cannot show a believable path to a $1 billion ARR business, your team’s project gets shut down. Unless it falls within strategic priorities which are pretty much just search and ads (eg. this is why Android continues to get support - because it represents mobile defense of Google’s lead in search and ads, not because the phone business on its own is worthwhile to Google).
FWIW I don’t think this is necessarily a bad way to run a company. Focus resources on your core competencies. But it really sucks as a user of their non-search-related products.
They’d almost be better off running them as independent startups that the Google brand just acquires if they take off. Would hurt less when they get shelved.
Google makes so much in ad revenue that they don’t care about anything else. They can afford to dabble in hundreds of side projects without feeling any actual pressure to deliver on them.
Eventually, the half-assed commitment leads them to cancel projects, or pivot, or start over from scratch. It’s almost predictable at this point.
So true. If a Google team cannot show a believable path to a $1 billion ARR business, your team’s project gets shut down. Unless it falls within strategic priorities which are pretty much just search and ads (eg. this is why Android continues to get support - because it represents mobile defense of Google’s lead in search and ads, not because the phone business on its own is worthwhile to Google).
See https://killedbygoogle.com/
FWIW I don’t think this is necessarily a bad way to run a company. Focus resources on your core competencies. But it really sucks as a user of their non-search-related products.
They’d almost be better off running them as independent startups that the Google brand just acquires if they take off. Would hurt less when they get shelved.