Google Timeline

By kyle410

  • Meeting of Minds

    Larry Page met Sergey Brin. At the time, Larry Page was a Ph.D. student at Standford University, and Sergey was considering studying there. Google's first data center was Larry Page's dorm room.

  • Search Engine Visions

    The Pair began to work on a search engine called "BackRub" for it's use of ranking how many "back-links" a page has. This engine worked on the Stanford servers for more than a year before it eventually clogged up the bandwidth and was forced to move.

  • Welcome Google.com

    Google.com was registered on September 15th, 1997.
    The name Google is a play on "googol," which is a mathematical term for the number 1 followed by 100 zeros. It is rumored that this reflects the founders' mission to organize the infinite amount of information on the internet.

  • First Office

    Google's first office was, classically, a friend's garage in Menlo Park, California. It came with a remote controller for the garage door. Google also hired its first employee, Craig Silverstein, who stayed with the company for more than ten years before joining another startup - Khan Academy.

  • Funding

    In August of 1998, Sun co-founder Andy Bechtolsheim wrote a check for $100,000 to the as yet non-existent company Google Inc. He did this after seeing a quick demo on the porch of a Stanford faculty member's home in Palo Alto.

  • New Office

    In 1999, Google moved from its humble garage to new digs at 165 University Avenue, Palo Alto. At this time they were eight employees strong. Their most important team member, Yoshka the dog, also joined the team at this time.

  • Almost Sold (good thing they didn't)

    In the early months of 1999 Page and Brin toyed with the idea of selling their project in order to focus on their studies. They approached George Bell, CEO of Excite, with a $1M buyout offer. Bell rejected this offer as "preposterous". They then asked for investment instead from, which Bell also declined.

  • New Investors

    Five months after being turned down by George Bell, they found investment through Kleiner Perkins Caufield, and Byers and Sequoia Capital agreed to invest $25 Million in the company.

  • Turn of the Century

    2001 saw Google's first public acquisition, Deja.com Usenet Discussion Service, which was an archive of 500 million user discussions dating back to 1995. Other improvements to Google included multilingualism, international celebrations (Bastille Day), and Google toolbar, a plugin that allows the user to search without opening the homepage. Google kept things light by adding "joke languages", including Klingon, and launching Google Images.

  • First International Office

    Google goes International by building their first office in Tokyo

  • Introduction of Advertising

    Google introduced additional advertisement services with its Search Appliance and the addition of cost-per-click pricing

  • Announcement of Google AdSense

    AdSense works by matching ads to websites using an algorithm that bases the placement on type of content and number of visitors. This was not only a boon to advertisers, but caused the blogging movement to explode in popularity by making it easy for bloggers to earn revenue based on their subject matter and number of viewers.

  • Googleplex and Gmail

    By 2004, the company had grown to more than 800 employees. So, they moved to new offices at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, known as the "Googleplex". On April fools day that year, Gmail was launched as an invite-only service. It now has more than 425 million users.

  • Google Scholar

    Google established Google.org which was dedicated to the idea that technology can change the world.
    Also in 2004, Google launched its Google Scholar service, a free web-based service that indexes the full text, or metadata, of scholarly literature across many publishing formats and disciplines.

  • Google Maps and Apps in General

    Google Maps was born, with satellite imagery and directions added a few months later. Also in 2005, YouTube's (not yet part of Google) first video went online. Phone apps became a big part of Google's strategy in 2005 with search software and Google Maps available on mobile platforms.

  • Google Translate

    Google Translate it launched with the mission of breaking language barriers and making the world more accessible.
    Google calendars, finance, and trends were also released, and youtube was acquired for $1.65 billion

  • Respected Company

    In 2007, Fortune ranked Google the number one company to work for.

  • Google Chrome

    Google Chrome was born in 2008 and fast became one of the world's most-used web browsers.

  • Google Flights

    2011 saw the launch of Google Flights. This service was the product of Google's acquisition of ITA Matrix Software (a travel industry software best known for its Matrix flight search). This service enables users to search and book flights through third-party suppliers. It has, in its own way, helped challenge the dominance of other sites like Kayak or Skyscanner.

  • Google Fiber

    The installation of Google Fiber began in 2012 by supplying consumers in Kansas. The company also created the Global Impact Awards to support entrepreneurs who use technology to tackle human challenges in an attempt to burnish the company's image for sustainability.

  • Sustainability Commitments

    In 2013, Google topped up its commitment to renewable energy by investing $200 million in a wind farm in Texas. The company also unveiled a plan to provide balloon-powered internet access, so-called "Project Loon" and teamed up with Starbucks to provide free WiFi to all Starbucks stores in the U.S.

  • Google Classroom

    In 2014, Google launched its free web service Google Classroom. Created with the aim to simplify the creation, distribution, and grading of assignments, it has since proved pivotal in streamlining the process of sharing files between teachers and their students.

  • Google photos

    2015 saw the launch of Google Photos (not to be confused with Google Images). This free photo sharing and storage service and was originally part of Google+ before being spun off.

  • Fined for monopolistic practices

    The EU’s regulatory body, the European Commission, determined that Google was prioritizing its own shopping service in ads displayed in the Chrome browser, which is preloaded by default on most Android smartphones. Although largely seen as a slap on the wrist that comes too little too late, the fine is part of a larger realization from policymakers and the public that Google, and its fellow Silicon Valley giants Facebook and Amazon, may have long since entered into monopolistic territory.