Who Founded Google?
Google is a digital behemoth that has become a household name around the globe. But the technology giant didn’t come from nowhere. It was founded by two computer-genius friends, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who had a vision to make the world’s information more accessible and useful to people. This article will explore the story of how Google came to be, sharing the backgrounds and motivations of the two original founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
Who Are Larry Page and Sergey Brin?
Larry Page and Sergey Brin are well-known in the world of technology, but who are they? Both Larry and Sergey were born to academic backgrounds, with Larry in Michigan, USA, and Sergey in Moscow, Soviet Union. They each went into higher education in the mid-1990s and crossed paths at Stanford University’s graduate programme.
Larry Page
Larry attended the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, where he obtained a B.S. in Engineering in 1995 and an M.S. in Computer Science the following year. By 1998, he had received his PhD in Computer Science at Stanford University. His primary reason for attending Stanford’s graduate school was to find an advisor in the field of artificial intelligence.
Sergey Brin
Sergey was born in the Soviet Union and in 1979, immigrated to the United States with his family at the age of 6. He studied at the University of Maryland, College Park, before going on to earn a Master of Science degree in Mathematics and Computer Science at Stanford in 1995.
Larry Meets Sergey
Larry and Sergey first met in the summer of 1995 during their stints at Stanford, when the pair attended a lecture by digital libraries professor Terry Winograd. Larry was drawn to Sergey’s gumption and rebelliousness, and the two became friends for life. In the ensuing months, their friendship deepened, and the two began to collaborate on a research project.
Creating Google
In early 1996, Larry and Sergey had the idea to create a search engine that indexed websites based on the number of other websites that linked to them. They called it “BackRub,” and this was the first iteration of what would eventually become Google.
In the summer of 1996, Sergey dropped out of Stanford to work on the project full time, and Larry, soon after, followed suit. With the help of two outside investors, they began to build the infrastructure of what is now Google. In 1997, the two officially changed the name of the product to “Google”.
The Central Motivation
Although Larry and Sergey had remarkable technical chops, the central motivation for creating the search engine was to provide people with a better, faster way to access information. This was based on the belief that everyone had a right to access to the world’s vast store of information and knowledge.
The Rise of Google
In 1998, Google Inc. was born, and the search engine steadily grew in popularity and technology. By 2001, it was the favored search engine of America and Europe, and by 2004, it had become the global leader in search engine algorithms, technology, and market share.
From Spare Bedroom to Multi-Billion Dollar Corporation
The original Google headquarters was a friend’s garage located in Menlo Park, California. Over the intervening years, however, Google has grown from a website born in a spare bedroom to a publicly-traded, multi-billion dollar corporation with offices around the world.
Re-Organizing the Corporate Structure
In 2015, Larry and Sergey initiated the restructuring of the corporation, creating Alphabet Inc. to operate as the umbrella organization governing a huge array of businesses, of which Google is the largest by far. Larry and Sergey left day-to-day operations of Google to its current CEO, Sundar Pichai.
Since its humble beginnings, Google has grown to become an indispensable component of modern life. Its two founders, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, had a shared vision of making knowledge more accessible and valuable to the world. Their grit and dedication, paired with a passion for innovation, propelled Google to become an international leader in digital technologies and services.
