Latest in Google

Apple became the world’s most valuable company Friday, dethroning state oil giant Saudi Aramco, and Amazon founder-CEO Jeff Bezos saw his net worth surge as stocks jumped following a round of stellar tech earnings. Apple and Amazon (along with Facebook and Google parent Alphabet) all reported second-quarter numbers…

The Australian Government Friday unveiled a draft of the new mandatory code of conduct that would force tech giants Google and Facebook to pay for news on their platforms. The document developed by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission will be open for public review through August 28 and go before…

UPDATED with comments from CEO/CFO conference call:  As YouTube advertising firmed nearly 6% to $3.8 billion in the second quarter, Wall Street also tried to get sense of YouTube TV, which isn’t broken out in the earnings reports of Google parent Alphabet. When one analyst asked CEO Sundar Pichai if YouTube TV would…

Disappearing journalism jobs were among the many ills laid at the feet of top tech execs Wednesday as House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-NY) at an antitrust hearing lamented the decline of local news and recalled a massive mess up by Facebook five years ago that accelerated the contraction in the…

The current throwdown between Amazon and HBO Max got pulled into a tech titan hearing on Capitol Hill Thursday. A member of a House subcommittee wondered why the Jeff Bezos company couldn't rightfully be accused of a "structural conflict of interest" in negotiating terms as a video gatekeeper and a video competitor to…

UPDATED, 3:49 PM PT: The CEOs of Google, Facebook, Apple and Amazon are testifying on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, in an unusual hearing that reflects the extent to which lawmakers have focused their scrutiny on tech platforms. Hollywood’s lobby in D.C. is mainly watching from the sidelines, even as it has a vested…

Google employees will work from home at least until next July due to the coronavirus pandemic, a decision that makes the search engine company the first major U.S. corporation to commit to the year-long stay-at-home plan. According to a report in today’s Wall Street Journal, Google’s plan affects nearly all of the…

Google has reached an agreement to purchase a 7.73% stake in Indian telecommunications giant Jio Platforms, a subsidiary of Reliance Jio, for $4.5B, pending regulatory review. The move marks the company's first investment as part of its $10B Google for India Digitization Fund, which was announced earlier this week as…

Peacock, the NBCUniversal streaming service initially launched in April, has set a distribution deal with Google for its national expansion in July. Google platforms and devices spanning Android, Android TV and Chromecast will begin carrying Peacock on July 15. Starting then, Peacock will offer a free tier featuring…

In a two-act annual meeting Wednesday, Google parent Alphabet ticked off good deeds from a $12 million pledge to further racial equality and 200 new initiatives around COVID-19 — from $800 million in ad grants and loans for small businesses to an expansion of Google Classroom to PSAs on YouTube. Then shareholders took…

Google has unveiled its plans for a gradual reopening as America attempts to rebound after the coronavirus lockdown. CEO Sundar Pichai told staffers who want to return to their offices that the company will start out at 10% of building capacity on July 6 with a 30% capacity by September. In an emailed blog post (read…

Institutional Shareholder Services, an influential de facto corporate watchdog, is advising stockholders to vote no on executive compensation for Netflix, Comcast and Google parent Alphabet at annual meetings this week and next, while slamming the pay criteria at Facebook. ISS is one of a handful of firms that…