Podcast: Google Shoots the Moon

For our first podcast we discuss Alphabet's (Google's parent company) recent earning report. Their moonshot projects (innovation initiatives) lost $859 million last quarter, compared to $660 million in the same quarter of 2015.

Our discussion focuses on innovation. We don't think Alphabet needs all of their bets to pay off. They're playing a long game on big ideas with a potentially big payoff. Meanwhile, they fund these initiatives with their core business revenue. Also...Polly muses on what "lumpy" means and Josh shares just how likely it is for someone to click on a display ad.

Key Insight On Innovation

Most organizations panic at the first sign of trouble. New ideas take time to get adoption. Give your new ideas enough time to succeed, but cut your losses when you need to. For example, Google nixed Glass when it wasn't paying off, even as they continued to invest in other moonshot projects.