Principles of Management

Case Study Google Entrepreneurs win big

Submitted to: Mr. Khalid m Zafar Author: Umair Zia BS37 3174 5/15/2012

Larry Page and Sergey Brin incorporated Google in 1998 and turned the company into the worlds leading search engine. The story of Google provides an example of how entrepreneurship fundamentally changed an industry.

Contents
SYNOPSIS .................................................................................................................................................... 2 Question 1 ..................................................................................................................................................... 3 Question 2 ..................................................................................................................................................... 4 Question 3 ..................................................................................................................................................... 5

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SYNOPSIS

Larry Page and Sergey Brin incorporated Google in 1998 and turned the company into the worlds leading search engine. The story of Google provides an example of how entrepreneurship fundamentally changed an industry. Page and Brin had an idea that changed the search process by focusing more on Web page popularity than on the number of times a given search term appeared on a Web page. They then linked search advertisements to these search results, which led in turn to extraordinary profits. Although the company started small, today Google is worth hundreds of billions of dollars. As such it is difficult to think of Page and Brin as entrepreneurs today; instead they are leaders of one of the worlds largest and most influential companies. Entrepreneurship remains important at Google, particularly corporate entrepreneurship. Instead of individuals pursuing opportunities, today Google as a corporation pursues opportunities. This culture of entrepreneurship has helped Google maintain the diverse opportunities it pursues today. For example, today the company offers movie making software, picture editing software, mapping software, and social networking Web sites. Taken together, Googles founders had an idea and identified an opportunity, they then evaluated the opportunity and started their own venture and within 10 years it is ruling the internet industry and has the potential to grow further.

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Question 1

Do you think Google will be able to maintain its entrepreneurial culture in spite of its recent growth and increased size? Why or why not? Yes, Google is and will be able to maintain its entrepreneurial culture in spite of its growth. Instead of individuals pursuing opportunities, today Google as a corporation pursues opportunities, evaluates them and turn them into lucrative ventures. This culture of entrepreneurship has helped Google maintain the diverse opportunities it pursues today. Google is continuously trying to create new systems, resources and processes to produced new services and server in new markets. Google started off as a search engine but today Google offers diversified services to people around the world. For example, today the company offers movie making software, picture editing software, mapping software, and social networking Web sites such as Google+. Google Translator now translates over 20 languages benefiting people around the world in communication. Google Earth service provides satellite images and provides navigation services. Google have hired Idea Champions who are constantly coming up with new ideas and creating opportunities, its lavish offices provides just the right environment to aid its employees to come up with creative ideas.

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Question 2 In your opinion, what were the key factors in determining the success of Googles entrepreneurial founders? Page and Brin first identified the opportunity, they understood that the search process could be improved and they believed that they have the resources (skills) necessary to improve the process. They then evaluated the opportunity that whether the idea was practical. For their analysis they likely gathered information on current industrys competitors and market situation. It was also important for Page and Brin to understand the entrepreneurial risk associated with their new search engine if the idea failed then they would have loose on the time and money they have invested in the project however since it was a services business there was not much cost involve and only needed the skills that the two graduates had. After identifying and evaluating the opportunity, Page and Brin decided to exploit the opportunity. Page and Brin had the commitment and determination to peruse the opportunity and they had the leadership skills that helped them start a venture on their own and build a team. They were market driven and were obsessed with offering a search engine that would give value to the users. They were not scared of the risks or uncertainties about the project. They were creative and came up with an idea which took them to the top. They had the motivation to excel that enabled them to push on their strengths and cover up their weaknesses. They started small but today they are the leaders in the industry.

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Question 3

As you look into the future, what do you think represents a bigger threat to Google: established companies like Microsoft or smaller, entrepreneurial companies? Explain. It is apparent that Google is currently facing immense competition from bigger established companies like Microsoft, Yahoo etc. and to keep up in this competitive environment Google is constantly improving its search process and its other services. This continuous improvement helped Google to maintain 64% of the market share in US and it is even more in other parts of the world. However in my opinion smaller entrepreneurial companies possess a bigger threat to Google. This is because all small companies today may become large companies tomorrow. As with Google itself, it started small where Yahoo was a large established corporation but the idea Google generated out performed Yahoo and now Google owns 3 times the market share then that of Yahoo. Also a new small entrepreneurial company named Facebook is rapidly growing and has already grown to an extent where Google is following it. Facebook a social network was an idea that proved to be lucrative for Mark Zuckerberg the founder of Facebook and recently Google launched its social network service with the name Google+ (Google Plus) to compete in this industry. Small entrepreneurial companies have fresh ideas and they have the vigor to compete with large firms and the desire to be at the top. These small companies continue to prove to be a potential threat to large well established companies.

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