Google Case Study

Case Study: Is Google Too Powerful?

Introduction

Google Inc. is a multinational public corporation which industrialised in offering Internet search services and computer software. The company was founded by Sergey M. Brin and Lawrence E. Page in September 4, 1988 in Menlo Park, California. Google served worldwide with its services and products and was headquartered in California, United States. Google's rapid growth since its incorporation has triggered a chain of products, acquisitions, and partnerships beyond the company's core search engine. The company offers online productivity software, such as its Gmail-mail software, and social networking tools, including Orkut and, most recently, Google Buzz. Google's products extend to the desktop as well, with applications such as the web browser Google Chrome, the Picasa photo organization and editing software, and Google Talk instant messaging application. Notably, Google leads the development of the Android mobile phone operating system, used on a number of phones such as the Nexus One and Motorola Droid (Wikipedia, 2010).

a) What problems and challenges does Google face in this case? What people, organisation and technology factors are responsible for these problems and challenges? Does Google’s business strategy effectively address these challenges? Explain your answer.

Problems and challenges

One of the problems faced by Google is being sued by Viacom over copyright infringement in YouTube. Viacom charged YouTube for allowing users to upload copyrighted clips such as “The Colbert Report”, “South Park” and other TV shows which infringed the copyrights. Then, Copiepress newspaper won a copyright case which could limit the Google’s usefulness (Hof, 2007). The lawsuit is the most serious legal challenge over intellectual property rights which represent a serious intensity in the conflict with YouTube (Broache and Sandoval, 2007). Besides that, Google was also sued by a group of publishers in the year...