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[timesonline.co.uk...]
Perhaps the founders are just fed up of the investment bankers telling them how to run their business.
Then they should never IPO.
Man, I feel sorry for the employees at Google. You know they're chomping at the bit for the IPO to happen.
I wonder if Google's Adsense payments and Adwords revenue aren't adding up. I mean, I wonder if they're inflating payouts on Adsense to get people to use it which couldn't be sustained if the payouts were not inflated for Adsense marketing purposes. If that's the case, they'd have to deflate/normalize the payments before they could IPO. If the IPO is delayed, I predict a decrease in Adsense payouts in the near term.
1. They are not worried by Yahoo's defection. They are viewing it as freedom to build out Google to a level that no one dreamed of.
2. They are not worried by Microsoft. MSN as a portal is a joke. The only reason people go there is related to bundling and browser start pages. No one goes there for the content if they weren't pushed there. And Microsoft has tried to make msn a great portal for many years.
Google is very confident in its abilities. It feels that the brand it will be building and the new value they will have now that the Yahoo shackles are off will far outweigh timing the market. When you are strong, have no debt, great prospects, you can wait and wait and wait. Sooner or later the market will always bounce back. They feel they'll be stronger after the next round of building their portal. And I agree with them. Remember, Adsense popped up out of nowhere. They probably have some other adsense-like ideas just waiting to be released.
posted by Yidaki
Me, i would never IPO with a company that already drives that much profit ... no matter what timing.
I think that's an even better strategy. It may not result in the maximum personal wealth for the founders. But it sure is the best way to see your vision through to the end and keep control. Not that Google agrees. They will one day go public.
I don't believe this article rules out a Google IPO in '04 at all. Nothing's official. Until y'all hear from Morgan Stanley/Goldman Sachs.
Unless I am incorrect, Google is not a 'start page' for anything...it is PULL traffic. MSN is push traffic...or clueless traffic.
They have a lot to learn about BIG business. They are still a young company compared to companies that have successfully moved operations to other countries, like Motorola, HP, IBM, et. al. But that is just my opinion based on what I have seen in quality control for 25 years.
all that love that could be shown to Google
I think Google currently has a lot of love from the general public. However, if the results continue in the vein they have been, that fickle 'little' joe surfer will soon have a few alternatives to look at!
As with many companies and across many sectors, once a company goes public the wolves come out. World stock markets are notoriously short-termist so this would leave Google having to bring in more and more revenue in a smaller and smaller market to satisfy it's investors.
Who gets squeezed?
In the main, the advertiser - 10p (in UK) min clickthrough wouldn't take too long to be implemented. And I am sure they would think of many more ways to increase the advertising buck!
I for one would like to see Google stay as it is and concentrate on getting it's search filled with good results - after all that's how it's got to where it is today.
1. They are not worried by Yahoo's defection. They are viewing it as freedom to build out Google to a level that no one dreamed of.
How? By becoming a portal and competing head to head with Yahoo and MSN? Oh boy.
2. They are not worried by Microsoft. MSN as a portal is a joke. The only reason people go there is related to bundling and browser start pages. No one goes there for the content if they weren't pushed there. And Microsoft has tried to make msn a great portal for many years.
A joke? How?
Enough people go there for them to be #2 and I doubt the majority of users cares where he gets his news or even what his home page is. And with more and more non-technical people coming online and seeing their computer as an appliance and not a hobby or a business, bundling and start pages will become even more important. Even more imporant than that will be a search box from the desktop. I wonder if Google will sue MS citing anti-competitive practices for that.
Some people get it - some people don't.
That that don't get, will eventually get it in a couple of years when they turn on their computer and MSN is their only allowable start page.
Nice search engine, probably a lousy stock.
Be it a search update, AdSense or IPO none of us ever have hard facts.
Makes life somewhat interesting.
Sending mixed messages out into the market, specially from the top is not good. It annoys journalists, financial analysts, retail buyers and gets nowhere.
A good sales person knows, its about setting and meeting expectations... if they send out mixed messages, they don't set expectations correctly and don't meet the ones that they have set.
I for one would like to see Google stay as it is and concentrate on getting it's search filled with good results - after all that's how it's got to where it is today.
How? By becoming a portal and competing head to head with Yahoo and MSN? Oh boy.
A joke? How?Enough people go there for them to be #2
I don't mean they are a joke in terms of their number of viewers or power. But their "power" lies not in the quality of MSN. It lies in the power of controlling the desktop. Google gets people to its site by its quality. That is a HUGE difference. (Some people will counter that its PR, but the fact is their search quality has been top notch fairly consistently for a long time. I doubt you can name another SE that had the same consitent overall quality and usabiliy for as long.)
Some people get it - some people don't.That that don't get, will eventually get it in a couple of years when they turn on their computer and MSN is their only allowable start page.
If Google has the mindset that I think they do, I would say they view the internet the way bill gates viewed the desktop. Microsoft today is where IBM was back then. And there is opportunity. They don't need to go on anyone else's schedule. They just need to make sure to get their SERPS back in order and slowly build unique new things.
Do you doubt they have big plans to portalize the big G? Could the writing be any more on the wall than it is? Google News. Google Labs. Adwords. Adsense. Orkut. Giving employees all this "free time" to work on "independent" crap. Pyra Labs. Talk of Google email. Webquotes. API. etcetera.
If Google is getting ready to file their S1 Statement, they will enter a 'quiet period' where they cannot officially comment, Dr. Schmidt may have been asked that question at exactly the wrong time and that may have been the only allowable statement he could make. We've already seen GoogleGuy and company fall off of the boards recently. Why?
In April, they will have to reveal their financials anyway due to the size of the company and number of existing shareholders unless they restructure their company into different operating units that are majority owned by outside entities. Highly unlikely.
The investors in Google including Kleiner, Perkins and Sequoia didn't invest in Google only to keep it private. They have limited partners and investors of their own to answer to and I'm sure they are all screaming for an IPO. With two boards seats, I'm sure they also have some influence on the timing of the IPO.
I'm still betting on sooner rather than later.
EquityMind
The question for me is why do they need to go public at this time?
Man, I feel sorry for the employees at Google. You know they're chomping at the bit for the IPO to happen.
While we don't discuss finances and I've also had the good tact not to even bring up the subject of Google's possible IPO, I can tell you that my friends work at Google because they love working there. At risk of sounding a bit sappy here, my friends love their colleagues, they greatly enjoy the Google perks (one of them gets three free good meals a day at Google, plus Clif bars for her camping trips), and above all, they are challenged and excited by their work.
Do they think about money? About possible IPO riches? I have no doubt.
But is that stuff their primary motivation? Should we 'feel sorry' for the GoogleGuys and GoogleGals? No way.
There is something really important behind this decision. Maybe the world + dog will be allowed to discover it later, maybe not...
they greatly enjoy the Google perks (one of them gets three free good meals a day at Google, plus Clif bars for her camping trips),
So, she's a first class google citizen. When the
filing comes out, it'll be very interesting to
see how many second class citizens they have, aka
contract employees without such perks. Maybe they
also need to clean up this part of the picture
before filing the ipo documents.
+++
If I was offered 20 billion pocket money with my co-founder from Migranesoft or someone else I might throw all career and professional considerations over board and take that little island with free view over the USVI's instead...
Jens
The recent Algo changes have not gone well for Google.
Ordinary users are noticing, I am getting feedback from my clients and friends that Google is not giving them what they want anymore.
Sure, some results are more relevant, but they are seeing some SERPS that just don't make any kind of sense.
My guess is that they are waiting to get this fixed and for Orkut to go mega - probably 6 months or so.
That pretty much puts Shak on the spot with his before Sept 2004.
Never bet against Shak;)
Google - only three of five. Better than it was about three weeks ago though then I only got two out of five satisfactory results.
I am sure this is will be resolved - but maybe this is one reason why the IPO 'may' be postponbed a wee while?
[edited by: Chris_R at 12:00 pm (utc) on Feb. 1, 2004]
[edit reason] removed specific terms [/edit]
This week No. I could not find several items I needed to buy. I am not an info searcher, but a buyer. I used AV. Great.
It occurred to me recently, that the AD revenue would actually go down in the medium term with poor SERP results. If I am no longer searching on google, then I cannot click on the Ad can I?
To me it Google needs to IPO ASAP, and I think Shak is right. (No way I am taking up that Bet :) ) IPO before Sept.
Google doesn't 'destroy' anyone. Small businesses that rely upon Google for their rent money destroy themselves.
Smart businesses diversify, earn customer loyalty, have blogs / e-mail lists, etc. and don't scream in pitied agony when Google SERPs change.
Is Google broken? Not on the whole, by my estimation. Some SERPs seem a bit screwy, I agree. And I'm sick of still seeing quite a bit of spam on unexpected terms. But I still use Google, my non-geek parents still use Google, my PR/marketing friends still use Google, and frankly, I've heard nary a peep of complaint 'cept for on Webmaster boards like this one.
I have no idea why Google has (or hasn't) delayed their IPO, but I sincerely doubt it has anything whatsoever to do with their SERPs.
"Sorry, Mr. Morgan, Mr. Stanley (yes, even Mr. Dean-Witter!) we can't IPO right now because too many webmasters don't like our search results"
