Search engine giant Google Inc on 10 August 2015 launched a new parent company called Alphabet Inc to separate its highly profitable search and advertising business.
The new parent company was formed as part of Google’s new organisational structure which will help the company to keep tremendous focus on the extraordinary opportunities and products.
Alphabet Inc will comprise of the search engine unit and all other subsidiaries.
Effects of the event
- Due to this decision, Google will be replaced by ‘Alphabet Inc’ as the publicly-traded entity
- Thus all the shares of Google will automatically be converted into that of the shares of new parent entity with same rights.
Highlights of the new structural arrangement
- Under the new structural arrangement, all subsidiaries of Google will be brought under the control of Alphabet Inc which will come into effect by 2015 itself.
- Alphabet Inc will be led by Co-founder and current CEO of Google Larry Page while Sergey Brin, the other co-founder, will serve as the President of Alphabet Inc and Eric Schmidt will be executive Chairman.
- Google’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Ruth Porat will become CFO of Alphabet and current directors of the company will become directors of Alphabet Inc.
- Chennai born Sundar Pichai will be the CEO of new Google that is now the subsidiary of Alphabet Inc.
About Sundar Pichai
- Full Name: Pichai Sundararajan, better known as Sundar Pichai
- He is a technology executive who is Product Chief at Google Inc.
- Pichai was announced as the next CEO of Google on 10 August 2015
Early Life
- Pichai was born in Madras, India in 1972.
- His father Raghunath Pichai was an electrical engineer for the British conglomerate GEC and managed a factory that made electrical components.
- Pichai grew up in Chennai.
Educational Background
- Pichai earned his degree from Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur (IIT KGP) in Metallurgical Engineering.
- He holds an MS from Stanford University in Material Sciences and Engineering and an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
- He worked in engineering and product management at Applied Materials and in management consulting at McKinsey & Company.
Career at Google
- Pichai joined Google in 2004
- At Google he led the product management and innovation efforts for a suite of Google’s client software products, including Google Chrome and Chrome OS, as well as being largely responsible for Google Drive.
- He went on to oversee the development of different apps like Gmail and Google Maps.
- On 19 November 2009, Pichai gave a demonstration of Chrome OS and the Chromebook was released for trial and testing in 2011 and released in public in 2012.
- On 20 May 2010, he announced the open-sourcing of the new video codec VP8 by Google, and introduced the new video format WebM.
- On 13 March 2013, Pichai added Android to the Google products he oversees.
- He was a Director of Jive Software from April 2011 to 30 July 2013.
Android was formerly managed by Andy Rubin. He was rumored to be one of the contenders for the CEO position of Microsoft in 2014.
CEO of Google
- Pichai was announced as the CEO of Google on 10 August 2015 after previously being appointed Product Chief by current CEO Larry Page on 24 October 2014.
- He will step into the new position upon the completion of the formation of Alphabet Inc., the new conglomerate for the Google company family.
