As such, the Cloud Platform is a priority for the tech giant – and so is its security. The Google Cloud Platform alone has over 100 products and creates $13 billion in revenue. In 2015, Google itself was re-organized into a subsidiary of a larger holding company known as Alphabet Inc. Google may have started as a search engine, but today it is a giant in the technology industry and one of the big five tech companies. Google’s list of acquisitions is a long list indeed, counting more than 240 purchases since 1998 when it was founded. If it had to go for another one, it would most likely be “If you can’t create it, buy it”.
Google had a motto for its corporate code of conduct: “Don’t be evil”. So this is the story of the big five tech companies and their big five acquisitions, as in cost of purchase, fame, or historical significance. The story of every corporation is that of its acquisitions. In a way, the multinationals are their subsidiaries. But did you know that Minecraft, the gaming phenomenon, is also under a Microsoft division? What about IMDb or Twitch being part of Amazon? For example, Hotmail being part of Microsoft is pretty much a given. Since the day they were founded, the big five tech companies have acquired numerous companies and made them subsidiaries. The name of the game: Merges and acquisitions.
And the way to growth is a one-way street.
Second, those are the leading companies that bring sociocultural evolution at a big scale and drive social change at full speed.Īs it usually goes with all businesses around the free-market world, big corps have two options: grow or perish.
First of all, the big five tech companies make up as much as 13% of the value of the whole S&P500 by market capitalization. The acronym, coined by Goldman Sachs, includes these companies for two reasons. Why is it GAFAM (or FAAMG), and not MAGA (Microsoft, Apple, Google, and Amazon) or FAANG (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Google)? Like with “Big Oil”,” “Big Tobacco”, and “Big Pharma”, “Big Tech” is here to stay and shape today’s society in more areas than just technology. The total value of the tech giants is over $5 trillion.