Google vs Microsoft (Happy 10th Birthday Google)
By Anna Johnson on September 13th, 2008It was Google’s 10th birthday last week. The company applied to incorporate on September 4, 1998 and its application was accepted on September 7, 1998.
Wow. To see a company grow from being nothing more than an idea for a better Internet search engine shared by two Stanford University students… to being one of the biggest companies in the United States based on market capitalization… in JUST 10 YEARS!
Has there ever been another company that has grown this fast? Is there another company that has even come close? Hmmm… Microsoft comes to mind as a company that grew to dominate software in a matter of years.
Funny that. The New York Times published an interesting article last week comparing Google and Microsoft. I’ve played around with some of the numbers to draw out a few more distinctions. Consider the following:
- Google’s age: 10
- Microsoft’s age: 33
- Google’s revenue in the last 4 quarters: $19.6 billion
- Microsoft’s revenue in the last 4 quarters: $60.4 billion
- Microsoft’s revenue at age 10: $140 million ($279 million in today’s dollars)
- Google’s net income in the last 4 quarters: $4.85 billion
- Microsoft’s net income in the last 4 quarters: $17.6 billion
- Google’s net profit margin: 25 percent
- Microsoft’s net profit margin: 29 percent
- Google’s employees, as at June 30: 19,604
- Microsoft’s employees, as at May 31: 89,809
- Google’s revenue per employee: $1 million
- Microsoft’s revenue per employee: $672,000
- Google’s net income per employee: $247,398
- Microsoft’s net income per employee: $195,971
- Google’s market value: $142 billion
- Microsoft’s market value: $241 billion
My hit prediction: if Google ends up displacing the operating system (with Chrome or otherwise), it won’t be long before it beats Microsoft on a number of fronts. Suggestion for Microsoft: be the one to displace the operating system first.
Source: Miguel Helft, “Google at Age 10″, The New York Times, September 4, 2008
