Google Going Public?

Anyone else catch this?

http://online.wsj.com/article_barro...HbKaEm4,00.html

- Shawn

Times like this call for only one word.

****.

I'd buy their shares.

The very instant.

Yes another reason that makes me think Google is all for the advertisor than a consumer. I'll write about it alittle later today. But I think its a bad move trying to raise 18 billion dollars to try to catch up to Yahoo!. At least the employees will be stinkin' rich.

-PK

Business is business. I bet it simply has to do with the economics of employing more people and building more offices than it does with 'catching up to Yahoo!', although it is all part of the same process really.

In my mind, they got really big really fast, and they have just enough revenue to keep hiring and hiring but they want to capitalize immediately to be able to draw out additional funds for large market media advertising and possibly even to buy out smaller competing underdogs.

Either way, that stock is going to be SICK.

Is it worth it?

With all this instability lately I dont intend on putting my $$ on google... They have become extremely popular over a very short time, however with Yahoo! trying to get back in the market, microsoft's annoucement of a new search engine, and the decreasing simplicity of google in general dont make for a very safe bet.

Any one else think that google is becoming to cluttered lately? Google prides itself on simplicity but with upto 10 sponsors listings, inclusion of dmoz descriptions and category's plus these supplemental results thing, ability to include symbols in the title the simplicity is diminishing.

There definitely is a fine line between functional complexity and ease of use. So far, I think they have balanced it pretty well though.

I think they will do fine as a public company... as long as they keep up with the innovations, they will always be one (or more) steps ahead of anyone else.

They have done a lot of innovation (especially in the recent months/years)... Look at things like:

• news.google.com
• froogle.google.com
• answers.google.com
• catalogs.google.com
• groups.google.com
• labs.google.com
• translate.google.com/translate_t
• AdWords
• AdSense
• Google API

Much of that Google was first to do... and what they weren't first to do, they usually do better. So I think as long as they keep innovating, users (and the stock market) will keep loving them.

- Shawn

They wont raise 18 Billion. That will simply be their market capitilisation, which equals total shares * price per share.1 billion shares @ $18 bollars == $18 billion Market capitalisation. Probably, they would raise barely a billion, maybe way less. If they sell 1o% of the company for $1 Billion, that would be a big surprise 2 me. With an IPO, it all comes down to what % of the company they want to give away, versus what they expect ppl 2 pay.

Agreed... and since Google is profitable to begin with, they don't really need the money to sustain. So I'm guessing they are not going to be offering many (percentage-wise) shares to the public. Which of course means the price on available shares will be driven up because there aren't enough to meet demand. Just my thought...

- Shawn

I wonder how the public will react when they release their quaterly profit reports. Even the CEO is reluctant to give that info up. Should be interesting.

-PK

They are no doubt profitable though... It took Yahoo a long time (and lots of investment money) to finally become profitable. I'll bet Google is more profitable than Yahoo (by far) already...

- Shawn

I believe Yahoo is more profitable and worth more than Google. Yahoo has more more money on hand. Owns more assets. Has been public for awhile. And have been around longer. Their networth overpasses Google by milestones. They just keep collectiong these companies that already have worth, assests and stock. Building itself larger and larger. Google dosn't. True Google has less profit sharing than Yahoo but Yahoo has more money making ventures than Google does. Unlike Google, Yahoo pushes product and ads very well and make their money through advertisers and comissions off of sales.

I have a migraine so i'll stop talking now

-PK

PS They both have more money than anyone knows what to do with.

Either way, it will be interesting to see their financials when/if they open up their books. I think they would be more attractive than Yahoo to investors... I think Google is wildly profitable and running pretty efficiently already without all the extra fat that Yahoo has. Yahoo is reporting 3,600 employees, probably 4 times what Google has. Even if Google earnings or profit are not above Yahoo's, I still think their earnings/profit per employee are much higher.

- Shawn