Executive summary
Google is a US international giant corporation that deals with Internet-based services and products. In the recent years, Google has been experiencing unprecedented growth and currently the corporation manages more than a million servers and attends to a billion plus search engine appeals in a day.
The initial operations of Google servers were constructed with cheap hardware. However, 2004 was the turning point of the company after the initial public offer, which saw the floating of 19,605,052 shares each going for $ 85. The capital raise through the IPO gave Google the much needed market muscle to face its competitors.
Google’s management has continuously adopted good management practices, which have seen the introduction of employee motivation programs like swimming, gaming, and bodybuilding practices in a gym among others.
Google has also embraced dynamic supply chain strategies that accommodate the ever-changing market demands. Conclusively, the operations and supply chain strategies, adopted by Larry Page and Brin, have evidently played an enormous task in enabling Google be an excellent company for its employees.
Introduction
Google is a US international corporation that offers Internet-associated services and products, comprising Internet search as well as advertising expertise. Google is a fortune 500 company. As the founders of the company, Sergey Brin and Larry Page jointly own 16 per cent of the total shares of the company. Google shifted to its present headquarters in California in the year 2006.
Fast growth has prompted a string of the company’s achievements and products (Clemons & Madhani 2010). Google has progressively turned into a hardware corporation having its collaboration with key electronics producers on its upper-end.
Roughly, Google manages more than one million servers in information centres all over the globe, and attends to more than a billion search appeals, as well as enormous user-created information daily. Google provides online software comprising social systems and email. The products of the company also include appliances for managing and editing pictures, Internet browsing, and online messaging.
Nevertheless, the prevailing market situation of the services of Google has brought denigration of the company regarding concerns of copyright, confidentiality, and control (Eko, Kumar & Qingjiang 2012). The success of the company undoubtedly translates to excellent environment for its employees.
This paper seeks to answer the question on the operations and supply chain strategy implemented by Larry Page in making Google an excellent area to work. The operations and supply chain strategy employed by Larry Page have led to the success of Google.
Funding and early public contribution
The initial operations of Google servers were constructed with cheap hardware. At this time, the working environment for employees was yet to be established. The initial financing was a contribution by co-establisher of Sun Microsystems, Bechtolsheim Andy, in the year 1998 (even prior to incorporation of Google).
A year later, in 1999, Larry Page and Brin attempted to sell the search engine, but the proposed bid failed to reach their expectations. In mid the same year, they got a $25 million financing with chief investors comprising the Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. The initial public offering (IPO) of Google happened in the year 2004.
A total of “nineteen million, six hundred and five thousand, and fifty-two (19,605,052) shares were offered at $ 85 each” (Finkle 2012a, p.869). The shares were traded in a distinctive online auction system. The contribution from the sale of the shares granted the company a market capitalization.
Yahoo, which is a business rival of Google, as well benefited from the sale of shares since it owned around eight million shares of Google prior to the IPO. During this period, Page, Brin, plus Schmidt Eric decided to work jointly for twenty years (until 2024).
Many people thought that the IPO of Google could bring modifications in the culture of Google, thus affect the working environment of its employees. Explanations extended from the force by shareholders to have worker benefits cut down to the reality that a vast majority of the company administrators could immediately become millionaires.
In response to this concern, Larry Page and Brin assured, in a statement to prospective financiers, that the IPO could in no way alter the culture of the company (Finkle 2012b). In an attempt to uphold the distinctive culture of Google, Larry Page and Brin created the office of a Chief Culture Officer.
The role of the Chief Culture Officer is to build up and uphold the culture. This officer as well functions as the Director of Human Resources. Nevertheless, there are claims of ageism and discrimination that the company has received from former workers (Finkle 2012b).
Operations and supply chain strategy
Larry Page adopted numerous operations and supply chain strategy to make Google an excellent place to work. In the working environment of Google, employees have an opportunity of spending off their calories in a gym filled with the necessary equipment.
For employees that are aquatically leaning, there are swimming pools where electric pumps are used to pump water in a single direction and thus create a current in that one direction, which ameliorates the swimming experience (Finkle 2012b). To keep them safe, lifeguards are provided.
Employees can as well play against one another in a fast game of billiards, football, or ping-pong. Game tables are found in numerous of the constructions on campus. Video games are as well available for those who love the games and this diversifies the options that employees have for relaxation (Finkle 2012b).
The healthcare plan of Google at the working environment allows employees to make appointment with a physician if they experience an injury or feel unwell when at work. In spite of the decent pay coupled with numerous perquisites, working at Googleplex comes with its challenges (Hagiu & Yoffie 2009). Luckily, for Google staff, they can make the most of a massage programme that is subsidized.
The twenty per cent time programme is another eminent advantage of working at Google. Google permits its workers to utilize up to 20% of their job week at Google to perform individual projects (Finkle 2012b).
Therefore, employees have one full workday to engage in activities outside the formal tasks. There are declarations that several of the creations in Google Labs initiated as pet schemes in the 20 % time programme. Since Google provides a comfortable work environment for its employees, the majority of them use approximately 20 hours at work because they have all they require (Finkle 2012b).
Larry Page and Brin have kept on making changes and moving past the search engine. Their operations and supply chain strategy directly works to better the working environment within Google for its employees. The company presents e-mail, immediate messaging, in addition to services of cell phone text messaging.
Further Google services comprise a computerized news spot, a network blogging spot, imaging software at no cost, and a spot for programmers concerned with forming fresh applications (Hagiu & Yoffie 2009). In the year 2006, the company was poised to confront PayPal in the online account dealing, and offer eBay a return for its efforts in the Internet auction dealing.
The e-mail service of Google is distinctive, similar to the company itself. Started in the year 2004 as Gmail (Google mail), it was accessible to beginners just on request from somebody who had the service already. Gmail includes e-mail as well as instantaneous messaging so that customers can e-mail in the habitual way and visit in actual instant.
The AdSense programme of Google is its main revenue producer. This programme permits every Web site to issue advertisements on every one of its pages. There is a reward to the issuer of the Web site each time somebody selects on an advertisement derived from that page.
Using this programme, it is also possible for Web site publishers to verify the number of people that log on to the site, the charge per selection, and click-through charges just to mention but a few (Hayes & Bodhani 2011).
This programme as well can modify the kind of advertisements put on a Web site, to be precise, publishers can obstruct adverts they do not need to come into view, for example, opponent ads, advertisements regarding death or hostilities, and advertisements for material for adults only.
Another service of the company popular with clients is Froogle that employs Google search expertise to let users hunt for and evaluate products by kind, cost, value, and other qualities. The company has evidently become a noteworthy existence on the Internet and in everyday lives of its users. This plays a key role in bettering the working environment for employees (Schmidt 2010).
Conclusion
It is frequently difficult to visualize life exclusive of computers; nevertheless, the progress in the computer world has been vast and unbelievably fast (Boyer & Verma 2009). This aspect has given room to services like those of Google, thanks to its founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
As outlined in this paper, Google has played a leading role in improving expertise such as information technologies through its various services. Indubitably, technological developments in Google have brought about reduction in costs to the user, better capabilities, pleasant environment for its employees, and excellent quality in every type of business making use of its products and services.
At times, it appears as if new experts of the company are arising every day. The operations and supply chain strategies, adopted by Larry Page and Brin, have evidently played an enormous task in enabling Google be an excellent company for its employees.
Reference List
Boyer, K & Verma, R 2009, Operations and Supply Chain Management for the 21st Century, South-Western College Pub., Nashville.
Clemons, E & Madhani, N 2010, ‘Regulation of Digital Businesses with Natural Monopolies or Third-Party Payment Business Models: Antitrust Lessons from the Analysis of Google’, Journal of Management Information Systems, vol. 27 no. 3, pp. 43-80.
Eko, L, Kumar, A & Qingjiang, Y 2012, ‘To Google or Not To Google: The Google Digital Books Initiative and the Exceptionalist Intellectual Property Law Regimes Of The United States and France’, Journal of Internet Law, vol. 15 no. 7, pp. 12-30.
Finkle, T 2012a, ‘Corporate Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Silicon Valley: The Case of Google, Inc.’, Entrepreneurship: Theory & Practice, vol. 36 no. 4, pp. 863- 884.
Finkle, T 2012b, ‘Note to Instructors for Corporate Entrepreneurship and Innovation In Silicon Valley: The Case of Google, Inc.’, Entrepreneurship: Theory & Practice, vol. 36 no. 4, pp. 885-887.
Hagiu, A & Yoffie, D 2009, ‘What’s Your Google Strategy?’, Harvard Business Review, vol. 87 no. 4, pp. 74-81.
Hayes, J & Bodhani, A 2011, ‘Google’, Engineering & Technology (17509637), vol. 6 no. 10, pp. 33-39.
Schmidt, E 2010, ‘Google’s CEO on the Enduring Lessons of a Quirky IPO’, Harvard Business Review, vol. 88 no. 5, pp. 108-112.