For several years now, it seems like every time I’ve turned around a new Google Something has popped up — Google This, Google That, and Google The Other Thing. Google has been all over the place, and generating enormous revenues in the process — the very model of a high-flying dot.com that, unlike so many others, showed no signs of crashing to earth.
Well, Google hasn’t crashed, but its revenue growth has slowed sharply and its stock has fallen by more than half in the last two years. As a consequence (perish the thought!), “corporate austerity is reaching one of the most extravagant spenders of the boom years.” Google is “ratcheting back spending and cutting new projects,” and the days of all those generous perks that Google employees enjoyed may be drawing to a close. Who knows? Perhaps the next arrival on the scene will have to be Google Bailout.
Here’s the story, as told by Jessica Vascellaro and Scott Morrison in the Wall Street Journal.