Google is its own hedge fund.
At this point, I've seen far too many disruptive, innovative startups get acquired by Google, only to be quietly drowned into the abyss. Their game is keeping everything as directly linked to search as possible.
At this point, I've seen far too many disruptive, innovative startups get acquired by Google, only to be quietly drowned into the abyss. Their game is keeping everything as directly linked to search as possible.
So the formula to overtaking Google is blindingly simple: change the game to make everything as unrelated to search as possible.
One could say Facebook is doing the exact same thing, but instead the mechanism hold a lock on is social, not search.
Search is the act of finding info on which to verb. Facebook and Google Search are not strongly substitutable goods. To eliminate google and bypass web search, you are looking at integrating better information retrieval services directly into the operating system. Google has already predicted this though. Chrome OS will be already be out and have established market position by the time everyone else realizes they need to focus on this.
Eliminating the OS interface and the web browser interface binary distinction will be key.
Google is so far ahead of the game that they're dealing with robot cars, if we want to find a chink in the armor we need to think 5 steps ahead.