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You'll hear this kind of thing from VCs, but VCs are used to investing in a number of bets that they expect to fail, but profit from the winners. The VC here se
by not2b 2y ago
You'll hear this kind of thing from VCs, but VCs are used to investing in a number of bets that they expect to fail, but profit from the winners. The VC here seems to be criticizing Google for doing the same thing internally ("The company has spent billions and billions of dollars per year on projects that go nowhere for over a decade"), complaining that most of the projects that are funded don't make money, as if management can magically know in advance which bets will work and which won't work.
I think the problem at Google is that they start too many things and don't follow through, and that they kill too many projects and products with happy users. But that's a management problem: they aren't using the workers as effectively as they could be doing.
- rsynnott 2y agoWell, arguably Google _is the competition_, so it's hardly surprising that VCs would moan about it.
- PaulStatezny 2y agoYour comment highlights that the "does no real work" verbiage is disingenuous / inflammatory. "Does no real work" is _very_ different from "does a bunch of work that gets thrown away".
- candiodari 2y agoIf only we had some sort of people who are supposed to provide this knowledge, in advance, of which projects will work and which won't. We might even call such a skill "vision". Oh wait. That's management's ONLY job.
- not2b 2y agoEven the most successful companies have had more than one expensive misfire. As long as things that work make more money than the things that don't work lose money, you're doing OK. A large and well-off company can afford to act like a VC for internal, experimental projects.