Larry Page was Google's founding CEO and grew the company to more than 200 employees and profitability before moving into the role as President, Products in April 2001. After Eric Schmidt's tenure as CEO, Page stepped back into that role in 2011.
The son of Michigan State University computer science professor Dr. Carl Victor Page, Page's love of computers began at age six. While following in his father's footsteps in academics, Page became an honors graduate from the University of Michigan, where he earned a bachelor of science degree in engineering, with a concentration on computer engineering. During his time in Ann Arbor, Page built an inkjet printer out of Lego.
While in the PhD program in computer science at Stanford University, Page met Sergey Brin and together they developed and ran Google, which began operating in 1998. Page went on leave from Stanford after earning his master's degree.
In 2002, Page was named a World Economic Forum Global Leader for Tomorrow. He is a member of the National Advisory Committee (NAC) of the University of Michigan College of Engineering, and together with Co-Founder Sergey Brin, Page was honored with the Marconi Prize in 2004. He is a trustee on the board of the X PRIZE, and was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 2004.
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Last Updated: Wed, Jul 27, 2011
Late one night, a group of excited people congregated in the office of Larry Page, co-founder of Google, over a bottle of champagne. Around 80 people came to watch the event from outside, curious about what was going on. The event was the signing of the AOL contract that was the culmination of months of hard work.
Larry Page, co-founder of Google, reveals that basic research and good ideas are the key components to creating a tremendous opportunity in the tech market. A lot of new knowledge is being created all the time and much of it can be used as the foundation for innovation.
According to Larry Page, co-founder and CEO of Google, not many companies are innovators in both technology and business. In order to be successful in technical innovation, says Page, you must understand the business and marketing side of the equation.
Google co-founder Larry Page provides several tips for entrepreneurs. Tip 1: Just don't settle. Especially with employees, it is very important to find great people you are compatible with. Tip 2: There is a benefit from being real experts. Experience pays off. Tip 3: Have a healthy disregard for the impossible. Stretch your goals. Tip 4: It is OK to solve a hard problem. Solving hard problems is where you will get the biggest leverage. Tip 5: Don't pay attention to the VC bandwagon. Don't start a company just because you can. Instead, have a really good idea that is good regardless of the funding situation.
Larry Page and co-founder Sergey Brin started Google while at Stanford working on their PhD's. When the company grew too big to be run from their dorm rooms, the founders made a pitch to a computer science professor who wrote them a $100,000 check on the spot. As of 2002, it is a company of almost 400 people, it handles over 1500 million searches a day, and it has been profitable for over a year.
Google tries to keep an entertaining and enriching corporate culture by taking company trips and implementing a dog-friendly policy.At the same time, the company tries to maintain an entrepreneurial culture by forming small teams that act like individual startups. The founders have discovered that the groups tend to become more traditional as they grow larger.
Google's mission, according to its founder Larry Page, is to organize the world's information, making it universally accessible and useful. They still believe that search can get a lot better and are working hard to make it so. Google has a global focus and is aiming to do things that matter to everyone around the world.
A large amount of time is spent in the hiring process at Google because the company is serious about employing only the very best people. Because of the high profile of the company, they receive over a thousand resumes a day, according to co-founder Larry Page and CEO Eric Schmidt. Many hires result from these resumes, but only after comprehensive reference checks.
Google makes money through selling targeted advertising on its site, which is more effective than broad-based advertising. In addition, they receive revenue from providing search capabilities to other companies, says co-founder Larry Page. Surprisingly, the model used today is remarkably similar to the original business model presented to venture capitalists.
Google competed with several other companies, including Overture, for the AOL deal. Though Overture offered more money because they are a public company, Google offered more ideas about additional services for AOL customers. The AOL CEO decided to make the decision that was best for the customers and went with Google, recalls co-founder Larry Page.
Everything at Google has turned out perfectly, making it hard to determine which decisions were good and which were bad. Co-founder Larry Page remarks that they could have started the company earlier, but were working on their PhD's. Also, it would have been difficult to achieve the same thing five years ago because the market was not as advanced -- and technology was more expensive and less established.
Google co-founders Page and Brin have a unique relationship. The duo share an office, which is said to be one of the most exciting places in the company. The founder-led company dynamic is an important factor in Google's success.
Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, talks about how real partnerships are a win-win deal. When making a deal, it is important to let your partner win, too, and to form an actual partnership rather than strictly relying on financial gain.
No matter what language people speak, there is much information that is not in their language. Right now, most of the information available online is in English, but that won't always be the case. Google has been interested in translation, especially as it applies to searching. As of this 2002 lecture, automated translation is not perfect, but co-founder Larry Page reports that they are working to make it better.
Google has been caught in the middle of free speech vs. censorship issues. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act states that if a company removes information from the internet when requested, they cannot be held liable. If the company is then counter-notified, they can put the information back up and remain legally neutral. Google has followed this policy, says co-founder Larry Page, but it has nevertheless sparked controversy.
The first aspect Google considers when hiring is evaluating the applicant's capability of simply doing the job. Next, they look for people who can think outside the box, but still work within Google culture. Third, communication skills are critical for any employee, even engineers. Overall, co-founder Larry Page and CEO Eric Schmidt have found that if someone is exceptional at something, it is usually a good indicator that they are exceptional at everything.
Google will always be a search engine, despite any additional directions the company may take, because it is a critical part of the mission the founders Page and Brin have defined. Also, says the company, the search engine is far from perfect and still requires many developments before it is complete.
Google's advertising model has been extremely successful, says CEO Eric Schmidt and co-founder Larry Page. Google has invested in technology to better target ads - and they've found that targeting ads well is in fact comparable to targeting search results.
Google increasingly has a global focus; as of 2002, traffic is now around 60% outside of the United States and growing. The search supports 74 languages, including many Asian languages, says CEO Eric Schmidt. There is tremendous growth in Japan, where the majority of portals and online services now use Google.
Looking back, it is easy to forget the tremendous risks co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin undertook to get to the place they are today. The co-founders once caused the whole Stanford network to go down for a significant amount of time while trying to develop Google. Page remarks that weird things happen when you are trying to touch every computer on the internet.