Alphabet overtakes Apple as world’s most valuable company

SAN FRANCISCO— Alphabet now comes before Apple atop the list of the world’s most valuable companies.

The shift occurred in Monday’s extended trading after Alphabet, Google’s new parent company, released a fourth-quarter earnings report that highlighted the robust growth of the digital ad market. Apple Inc.’s iPhone, meanwhile, is suffering its first downturn since it debuted eight years ago.

Alphabet Inc. earned $4.9 billion on revenue of $21.3 billion in the fourth quarter. If not for employee stock expenses and certain other items, Alphabet said it would have earned $8.67 per share. That figure easily topped the average estimate of $8.10 per share among analysts surveyed by FactSet.

The report provided the most detailed breakdown yet on the profits pouring in from Google’s dominant search engine and ad network. (Google reorganized itself under Alphabet last October.) Investors pushed up Alphabet stock $36.88, or nearly 5 percent, to $807.65 in extended trading.

Based on that after-hours bump, Alphabet’s market value stood at $555 billion while Apple’s was at $534 billion, based on the most recent regulatory filings showing the company’s outstanding shares. The rankings could quickly change again in regular trading Tuesday.

Apple’s stock has been sliding amid concerns over slowing iPhone sales. Meanwhile, Alphabet’s stock has surged by 45 percent since the end of 2014 when it was still trading under Google’s name.

The fourth-quarter report marks the first time Alphabet has spelled out the costs of running still-experimental businesses that are trying to do everything from eliminating human drivers to curing cancer.

Until now, Google chose to hide the expense of running those peripheral operations in its financial statement. The company’s opaque accounting made it difficult to know just how much profit Google reaped from its primary business — selling digital ads next to everything from search results to YouTube videos.

In the fourth quarter, Google produced an operating profit of $6.8 billion on revenue of $17.1 billion, after subtracting ad commissions. That translates into a whopping profit margin of 40 percent. Apple registered an operating profit margin of 32 percent in its most recent quarter.

Meanwhile, Alphabet’s other companies together produced an operating loss of $1.2 billion on revenue of just $151 million. Alphabet labels that category “other bets.” For the full year, Alphabet’s other companies lost $3.6 billion on revenue of $448 million.

The optimism surrounding Alphabet stems in part from hopes that the company is developing more financial discipline as it discloses more earnings details. Google had become known for its free-spending habits and reluctance to share information with analysts.

The change in sentiment coincided with Google’s hiring of a new chief financial officer, Ruth Porat, last May. Porat, a Wall Street veteran, has consistently signaled her intent to rein in spending.

Under the previous setup at Google, “things had always been a little muddy,” said Edward Jones analyst Josh Olson. “The hope now is that management will continue to show greater cost discipline.”

Google is also counting on advertisers to gradually pay more for marketing messages on smartphones. They still aren’t paying as much for mobile ads as on personal computers because ads on smaller smartphone screens strike many as less valuable. That’s one reason Google’s average ad rates, measured as “cost per click,” have been declining for more than four years.

In the latest quarter, Google’s cost per click fell by 13 percent from the same time in 2014. But Porat cited in increase in mobile search requests as one of biggest reasons that Google’s revenue rose by 18 percent from the previous year. As people increasingly search for information and shop on their phones, the company expects advertisers to ramp up their spending on smartphones, too.

source: business.inquirer.net

Google may return to China with Android app shop–report

SAN FRANCISCO, United States—Google is talking with Chinese authorities and smartphone makers about opening an online shop in China stocked with applications for Android-powered mobile devices, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

The move would mark a return for the US Internet firm, which moved its online search service from Mainland China to Hong Kong in 2010 after a cyberattack targeting Gmail users and a clash over censorship.

Many Google services, such as its free Gmail email, are blocked in China.

Google-backed Android powers the majority of the smartphones in the world and is available free for device makers in China and elsewhere.

Manufacturers such as Xiaomi customize their own version of Android, while Baidu and other Internet players in China run app stores that don’t share revenue with Google, according to the Journal.

Opening a Google Play online shop for digital content approved by the Chinese government and pre-installed on smartphones powered by a licensed version of Android would be a remedy for that situation.

Google has been working on the project for more than a year and hoped to have the China app shop on new smartphones by the end of this year, according to a source cited by the Journal.

Google did not immediately respond to an AFP request for comment.

source: technology.inquirer.net

Google refines logo as it prepares to join Alphabet

SAN FRANCISCO — Google is refining its famous logo as it prepares to become a part of a new holding company called Alphabet.

The revised design unveiled Tuesday features the same mix of blue, red, yellow and green that Google has been using throughout its nearly 17-year history, though the hues are slightly different shades.

Google also invented a new typeface called “Product Sans” that is meant to resemble the simple printing in a grade-school book. It will replace a serif typeface that Google has been using in its logo for more than 16 years. The “e” in the company’s name will remain slightly tilted to reflect Google’s sometimes off-kilter thinking.

Although this will be the sixth time that Google has changed its logo since Larry Page and Sergey Brin formed the company, this marks the most noticeable redesign since it dropped an exclamation point that appeared after its name until May 1999.

“I am sure this is going to upset a lot of people because everyone freaks out when a company like this makes a shift like this,” said Wally Krantz, executive creative director at brand consultants Landor. Krantz, though, applauded the change because he believes it gives the company a “fresh” look.

Google is donning the different look as it embarks on a new era.

The Mountain View, California, company is pouring so much money into so many far-flung projects that have little or no connection to its main business of online search and advertising that it’s getting ready to place everything under the Alphabet umbrella.

Under this setup, Google will retain search, YouTube and most of the biggest divisions while smaller operations such as Nest home appliances, life sciences, drone deliveries and venture capital investments will operate as individual companies. All will be overseen by Alphabet, whose CEO will be the Google co-founder Page.

Alphabet hasn’t revealed what its logo will be yet, but the holding company isn’t expected to be officially operating for a few more months.

Google believes its new logo will provide a more versatile identity suited “for a world of seamless computing across an endless number of devices,” the company said in a Tuesday blog post.

The overhaul also will change the appearance of the letter “g” that Google uses as its shorthand logo on the smaller screens of smartphones and other mobile devices.

The “g” will now be capitalized and displayed in color instead of being kept lowercase and white.

A swirl of dots in Google’s colors will also appear when a spoken command for information is being processed or one of the company’s other services is performing a task.

source: technology.inquirer.net

Google says ‘forgetting’ isn’t easy, as removal requests mount

SAN FRANCISCO — Google on Thursday told European officials that forgetting isn’t easy, especially when details are few and guidelines are murky regarding when personal privacy trumps public interest.

The world’s leading Internet search engine said that as of July 18 it had received more than 91,000 requests to delete a combined total of 328,000 links under Europe’s “right to be forgotten” ruling.

The most requests came from France and Germany, with approximately 17,500 and 16,500 respectively, according to a copy of a letter Google global privacy counsel Peter Fleischer sent to an EU data protection committee.

Another 12,000 removal requests came from Britain, 8,000 from Spain, and 7,500 from Italy.

Google said that 53 percent of the links targeted were removed.

But the California-based Internet titan said it was challenged by having to rely on those making removal requests for information needed to put them in perspective.

“Some requests turn out to be made with false and inaccurate information,” Fleischer said in the letter.

“Even if requesters provide us with accurate information, they understandably may avoid presenting facts that are not in their favor.”

For example, a person requesting the removal of links to information about a crime committed as a teenager may omit that he or she was convicted of similar crimes as an adult, or that he or she is a politician running for office.

Other requests might target a link to information about another person who happens to have the same name.

The 13-page letter contained replies to questions from a meeting last week between several Internet search services and the group of EU data protection regulators.

Google took the opportunity to ask for input on how it should differentiate what is in the public interest and what isn’t, and whether information posted online by governments can be “forgotten” at someone’s request.

Google has been working to balance freedom of information with privacy rights in the wake of the May ruling by the European Court of Justice.

The court said individuals have the right to have links to information about them deleted from searches in certain circumstances, such as if the data is outdated or inaccurate.

European news organizations have opened fire on Google for removing links to stories from search results in the name of adhering to the court order.

The links remain visible on Google.com, the US version of the site, and the restrictions only appear to relate to certain search terms, typically people’s names.

source: technology.inquirer.net