1.0.0 Introduction

It is not often that a single company can be so deeply entrenched in modern lexicon. While Google has almost become synonymous with search, it is important to note that Google is much more than just a search company. Beyond their core business of search and advertising, Google has built an impressive and diversified portfolio through both the internal development of additional services and products like Chrome, Gmail, Google+, Google Drive and Google Maps, and routine investments in companies from various industries and markets. To facilitate this process, Google has set up functional units like Google Ventures, which is the venture capital arm that allows Google to identify innovative companies for investment and potential acquisition; while Google X is a research and development lab dedicated to the development of experimental and radical technologies, one of which is Google Glass (Glass).

In this paper, Google’s technology strategy is analysed through the case study of Glass, before providing recommendations as to how Google can improve its competitive advantage.

2.0.0 Introduction to Google Glass

Developed in 2010 and launched in 2012, Glass is a form of wearable technology intended to make technology more ubiquitous than ever. Glass is Google’s first foray into the nascent smart-wear industry. Made with a thin titanium band mimicking the frame of a pair of eyeglasses, Glass projects information in front of the user’s right eye. All of its components are attached to this frame; however Glass is still relatively light with a weight of about 40 grams (Barley, Eisenmann & Kind, 2014).

2.1.0 Features of Google Glass

Glass is made of 7 main components that are shown in figure 1 – the battery, speaker, CPU, microphone, camera, display and a touchpad (not denoted in picture). The operating system (OS) that Glass runs on will also be discussed, as well as its connectivity, or the extent to which Glass can link up with other devices.

Battery: Glass possesses a 570 mAh lithium polymer battery (Swider, 2015), which is expected to last one day of typical use, although certain features such as video recording will deplete the battery more quickly (Google Support, n.d.).

Speaker: For the speaker, a bone conduction transducer is utilised to convey responses from Glass to commands, making the responses audible to only the user (Swider, 2015).

CPU: Teardown tests indicate that Glass has a dual-core 1 GHz processor with 2GB of RAM (Limer, 2013; Fitzsimmons, 2014).

Microphone: The microphone is one way for the user to control Glass and input commands. Some of the functions that can be accomplished with voice commands include taking a picture, getting directions, sending a message or making a phone call (Google Support, n.d.).

Camera: Glass has a 5 megapixel camera that captures photographs and videos up to a quality of 720p (Google Support, n.d.).

Display: The display of Glass is transmitted via a prism mounted above the right eye that “reflects an image of 640x360 pixels from an LED projector into the user’s retina” (Barley, Eisenmann & Kind, 2014). This results in the user viewing an image that appears projected from a 25 inch high definition screen 2.5 metres away (Google Support, n.d.).

Touchpad: The touchpad is placed on top of the CPU on the right side of the user’s temple and according to Simpson and Torborg (2013), “driven by a Synaptics T1320A touchpad controller”. It serves as another way for users to control Glass through backward and forward swipes.

OS: Glass runs on Android 4.4.2 (Google Support, n.d.).

Connectivity: Glass is able to connect to phones running on Android and iOS via Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, through the configuration application MyGlass to utilise the call, SMS, email and GPS capabilities of the phones. It has been noted however that making a connection to an Android phone provides higher functionality than connecting to an iOS phone (Swider, 2015).

2.2.0 Context of Innovation

According to Astro Teller, the director of the Google X lab, the ultimate goal of all technology should be become so perfectly integrated into our daily lives and routines

that we are not even conscious of using it, or in other words, “improve [humans’] lives and not take anything away” (Teller, 2014).  Currently, accessing information is easy but not seamless. The device we use most commonly to obtain information on the go is the smartphone. However, the operation of smartphones requires a great deal of attention and also, more often than not, the usage of both hands. This is highly inconvenient under certain circumstances such as driving, which also require these two elements. Smartphones therefore present a trade-off between the access to technology and the ability to give our full attention to the task at hand. Glass is the first innovative smart-eyewear product developed with the intention of providing people with the technology they needed without having to make this trade-off. It provides hands-free access to common smart-device functions such as capturing high resolution photographs and videos, surfing the Internet and getting navigational information via simple gestures or voice commands. Text and images are projected in front of the eye with a simple upward glance. This means that Glass can be used in situations where smartphones cannot. Additionally, since there are no similar products to Glass, this means that Google is the pioneer in the smart-eyewear market and is able to gain first-mover advantages.

2.2.1 Launch

Glass was first available to 2000 preregistered software developers in 2012 (Barley, Eisenmann & Kind, 2014). Availability was then extended to an additional 8000 early adopters under the Explorer program. As part of the program, participants, known as Explorers, had to purchase Glass at a price of $1500 and attend a fitting session along with a training camp (Barley, Eisenmann & Kind, 2014). Explorers were carefully selected by Google to ensure a diverse representation of potential users, including social influencers like policymakers and media figures. To attract developers, many online channels were created for them and Explorers to exchange ideas and collect feedback on how to improve both the applications and Glass. Subsequently, Google developed a collection of stylish eyeglass frames and included the option of adding prescription lenses to increase Glass’ appeal (Barley, Eisenmann & Kind, 2014).

2.2.2 Subsequent Distribution

Google utilised three channels for the distribution of Glass and its development kit, namely: online channels, partnerships and open platforms. On the hardware side, Glass was mainly distributed directly by Google via their online store and the Explorer program. Google further expanded the Explorer program in 2013, allowing each initial Explorer to invite three other people to purchase Glass (Tofel, 2013). In 2014, Google entered a strategic partnership with Luxottica, a leading eyewear company that owns many major eyewear brands like Oakley and Ray Bans, to jointly develop and sell smart wearables based on Glass (Luxottica, 2014). The ability to purchase Glass was then extended to anyone residing in the United States, and subsequently the United Kingdom (Frizell, 2014; Martin, 2015).

On the software side, Google began to allow some major third-party developers like Facebook and Twitter to create applications, known as Glassware, in April 2013 (Barley, Eisenmann & Kind, 2014). Later that year, Google proposed two more initiatives to spur the development of more Glassware. For the first initiative, Google Ventures, in partnership with two other venture capitalist firms, launched the “Glass Collective” that aimed to fund developers with the desire to build Glassware and businesses centred around Glass (Geron, 2013). The second initiative was the release of the Glass Development Kit (GDK) that granted a broader range of developers the ability to develop Glassware. This open platform meant that there were more sources for unique Glassware to be developed.

3.0.0 Evaluation of Glass

Overall Glass seems to be a failure, especially in the intended consumer market. First of all, the specifications of Glass were ultimately unimpressive. The 5-Megapixel camera present in Glass fared worse than most smartphones in the market at that time, such as the iPhone 5 which is bundled with an 8-Megapixel camera. The battery life reportedly lasted for only 3 to 5 hours (Swidler, 2015) which meant that users had to adopt extremely conservative usage patterns. Most importantly, there was a dearth of applications that were available for Glass, despite the twin initiatives by Google. Many of the applications available for Glass were also available on a regular smartphone. The distinct lack of a “killer application” meant that there was nothing unique that Glass could bring to the table that could not already be done with a regular smartphone (Hartung, 2015). In fact, most of Glass’ functions were better performed by smartphones. Hence, there was no compelling reason for consumers to purchase Glass.

Secondly, Glass was simply too expensive. The high price might be justifiable for the limited initial launch of Glass, since early adopters are likely to be price insensitive. However, even after Glass was available for purchase by the general public, the price remained at $1500. Subsequent customers are likely to be more price sensitive than the early adopters, which meant that the price was likely to be prohibitive, limiting the number of people willing to buy Glass. Coupled with the fact that Glass was unimpressive in and of itself, consumers were even more reluctant to purchase Glass. This in turn inhibited the growth of the user base, reducing the incentive for developers to develop Glassware, making Glass even less desirable to consumers and creating a vicious cycle. An article from Reuters (Glass Almanac, 2015) revealed that many developers abandoned their Glassware projects, causing early Glass users to swiftly lose interest and give up on Glass.

The third reason for the failure of Glass was the stigma surrounding Glass users, who were pejoratively referred to as “Glassholes”. People were uncomfortable around Glass users since they were afraid that they were being recorded without their knowledge, leading to the creation of a stigma. The stigma was so widespread that Google released an official “Do’s and Don’ts” list for Glass users in an attempt to combat it. This meant that beyond the lacklustre technical performance, social pressures were also working against the purchase and usage of Glass.

Ultimately, it boils down to one thing - Glass was released too early. Even though Glass was still branded a prototype by the Glass engineers, and hence unfit for release, Google cofounder Sergey Brin wished to launch the product as soon as possible (Bilton, 2015). This premature release meant that Glass had to debut with subpar technical specifications and a limited quantity. Furthermore, Google intended for the initial launch of Glass to be a beta, and hence priced Glass in an aggressive manner such that only a small number of people would be willing to purchase one. This unintentionally created an artificial exclusivity that contributed to the development of the social stigma towards people who actually owned Glass.

External factors also contributed to the failure of Glass. Due to privacy and safety concerns, Glass was banned from many places ranging from hospitals to banks and even while driving (Estep, 2013). The inability to use Glass while driving meant that one of the areas in which Glass might have truly been helpful (as a navigation tool) was out-of-bounds, thus further limiting the usefulness of Glass. In the end Glass became an expensive, stigmatised product that was not very good at the limited number of things it could do, which led to the ultimate failure of the device as a consumer electronic.

4.0.0 Technology Strategy of Google

As with all products, the way Glass was conceived and developed heavily depends on the technology strategy of the company. In the following segment, firstly the various aspects of Google’s technology strategy is described before investigating how well Glass is aligned to Google’s vision.

Google’s technology strategy can be summed up with a single word: Innovation. In order to achieve that, Google has implemented a series of policies that provides the ideal environment for innovation to take place. These policies are described in the book “How Google Works”, written by a group of top Google executives, including Google’s Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt.

4.1.0 Technological Insights

When deciding on the development of a new product, Google invests in new technology based on technological insights and not market research. Technological insight is defined as “a new way of applying technology or design that either drives down the cost or increases the functions and usability of the product by a significant factor” (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). This technological insight is what drives Google to focus on the maximisation of the capabilities of the technology as opposed to allowing market demands to dictate Google’s product development. By identifying gaps in current solutions, Google aims to deliver market changing products that fulfill a need that even consumers are unaware of. Google believes that this is crucial in allowing them to “avoid me-too products” (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014) and is a fundamental part of Google’s technology strategy. This means that Google is not only open to the idea of innovation, but also prefer to deliver a product that goes beyond the scope of current solutions on the market.

4.2.0 70/20/10 Rule

This belief is embodied in the company’s policies, the first of which is the “70/20/10” rule (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). According to this rule, Google will dedicate 70% of its resources to the core business of search and search advertising, 20% to emerging projects that already show some early success and lastly, 10% to completely new projects that may yield large payoffs but also possess high risks of failure. The authors explained that by only allocating 10% of the budget to new ideas, it means that these projects will be easier to “kill off” should they fail in the future. This is done to prevent over-investment, which in turn avoids confirmation bias, since a tendency to focus only on the positive points of a project will be created if the sunk cost is high, therefore obscuring sound decision-making (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). Beyond the practical reason of having the flexibility to pull the plug on projects, another reason behind the restriction of funding for new projects to 10%, is because Google has found that a limited budget stimulates creativity. Since teams only have a limited budget, they will be forced to come up with innovative ways to maximise their resources and to Google, this leads to greater ingenuity in developing the project (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014).

4.3.0 20 Percent Time

The other policy that embodies Google’s daring and open approach to technology strategy is the “20 Percent Time” programme. Not be confused with the 70/20/10 rule, the “20 Percent Time” programme refers to the freedom conferred onto Google engineers to spend 20% of their time working on whatever they desire. Any Google engineer can initiate a “20 Percent” project and be allowed to work on it whenever they wish. Furthermore, this system has a built-in filter that ensures only truly good ideas are worked on. Since “20 Percent” projects are employee-initiated, it means that the employees themselves are the ones responsible for finding team members to work on their project. This implies that the idea has to be good enough for other employees to be willing to contribute their time to the proposed project. It is through this “Darwinian process” (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014) that ideas get filtered, leaving behind the ones with real potential. The “20 Percent Time” programme has resulted in many innovative Google products such as Google Now and Google News. By conferring the freedom to innovate to all of its employees, Google is able to tap into a much wider pool of ideas.

4.4.0 Think 10X

The third area that shows Google’s attitude towards technology strategy comes in the form of Larry Page’s directive to “Think 10X” (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). Engineers and product managers are told to think 10 times bigger when trying to develop a solution to an identified problem. The rationale is that when required to deliver a small improvement in performance, all that is needed are tweaks to the current design, but when tasked to deliver a large improvement, it very often means that current designs will have to be abandoned and started again from scratch. This question of how to start over can uncover previously overlooked ideas (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). Therefore Google encourages “Think 10X” to exploit this ability to gain fresh perspectives towards the problem and develop radical and new ideas rather than just improvements to current ideas. The directive of thinking 10X has helped Google come up with radical projects such as Project Loon, which aims to deliver broadband internet to the underprivileged using helium balloons.

4.5.0 Ship and Iterate

The next aspect of Google’s technology strategy is the way they handle ideas that survive the development process to become actual products. The main idea is summarised as “Ship and Iterate” (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). Google believes that new ideas are never perfect right from the beginning, so they adopt the process of shipping a product out and iterate upon it by pushing improvements throughout its lifetime. The authors expressed the belief that “the companies that are the fastest at this process [of shipping and iterating] wins” (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). Furthermore, in the ship and iterate process, marketing and publicity efforts are kept to a bare minimum at launch. Such investments will only occur when the product gains enough traction purely by virtue of the product’s excellence. This further drives the need to deliver a quality product that does not depend solely on the strength of the Google brand (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014).

Along with “Ship and Iterate” comes a complementary principle, which is to “feed the winners and starve the losers” (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). Winners and losers are determined based on data and metrics to minimise the effect of the sunk cost fallacy. Once winners and losers are determined, more resources will be allocated to winners while losers will be starved of resources. The authors emphasised that this will be done regardless of prior investment. It is this ruthlessness that allows Google to quickly cut their losses on projects that are doomed for failure like Google Wave while allowing projects like Google Chrome to grow rapidly and organically even before obtaining marketing support.

4.6.0 Fail Well

The final aspect of Google’s technology strategy is the role of failure. Google is very comfortable with products failing and has the necessary infrastructure in place to handle failures, as explained above. This comfort also means that failure plays an integral role in Google’s technology strategy. The authors stated that any project that fails has to “fail well”. Even if the project has failed in general, it should still leave behind certain valuable parts that can be refined and used in other projects. Failing well is a by-product of thinking 10X. Larry Page stated that if one thinks big enough, the project is unlikely to be a total failure since there will be some valuable parts that can be salvaged (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). Therefore, Google is unafraid of failure. Google also hopes to cultivate this culture of not fearing failure amongst its employees and as such, do not stigmatise those that worked on failed projects. Any employee that previously worked on a failed project will not be denied the chance to get a good internal appointment. Not only does this encourage the ones who have already experienced failure, future innovators will also fear failure less (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014).

Another aspect of a “good failure” is that it has to be fast. Interestingly, the authors also stated that the “hallmark of an innovative company is that it gives good ideas plenty of time to gestate” and that they are “stubborn on vision and flexible on details” (Schmidt, Rosenberg, & Eagle, 2014). This seems like a contradiction since Google wants a quick failure, yet gives a long time horizon for each project. The authors explained the apparent contradiction with the principle of ship and iterate. The key is to iterate quickly and establish certain metrics that allow Google to judge if the product is approaching success with each iteration (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). Small failures revealed in this manner are both expected and allowed since they allow for the refinement of the project. The project can be judged to have officially failed when “achieving success requires multiple miracles in a row” (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). Therefore, to integrate failure into their technology strategy, Google employs a system of not mitigating risk or preventing failures, but instead understanding and accepting failure as a normal part of the development process.

4.7.0 Conclusion of Technology Strategy

In conclusion, innovation is carved into the backbone of Google as a company. They have a coherent and consistent technology strategy that promotes experimentation with new ideas, even if it means entering unknown territory, where risks are unclear. Google embraces new technologies with open arms and have the necessary frameworks and rules to facilitate their investments in innovation. This means that the risks that Google takes are actually calculated ones. Since Google has made provisions in all stages of the innovation process, it is both able and unafraid to experiment and innovate. From the provision of funding and a creative environment to the formulation of development and contingency plans, Google has the necessary structures in place to make an idea reality. This level of control helps define Google as an innovator and this attitude is reflected in their technology strategy.

5.0.0 Alignment of Glass with Google’s Technology Strategy

In general, Glass is well-aligned with the various aspects of Google’s technology strategy that are outlined above. However, there are some areas in which Glass falls short of complete compliance with the strategy, while insufficient information prevents us from being able to make a conclusive evaluation in other areas.

5.1.0 Alignment to Technological Insights

The motivation behind Glass was the perceived gap in the current usage patterns of technology. To Google, usage of technology should be seamless and natural, yet a disconnect or gap is still present between our “digital lives and in-the-moment physical lives” (Teller, 2014). They felt that making a smart-eyewear product, namely Glass, would be the answer to fill that gap. This adheres to Google’s vision of developing based on technological insights, rather than market demand, since there was no concrete evidence that demand for smart-eyewear was even present.

5.2.0 Alignment to 70/20/10 Rule

Despite the fact that Glass was a highly radical product that might not be well received by the market, funding for the project was still provided due to the adherence to Google’s 70/20/10 rule. Although it’s ascertain the exact amount of funding that Glass received, it can be postulated that since Google was willing to run the risk of investing in Glass, the amount of money invested is likely to be limited. This meant that even if Glass should fail, the budget for other organisational activities would not be affected due to the clear demarcation of the budget according to the 70/20/10 rule.

5.3.0 Alignment to 20 Percent Time

It is unclear as to whether Glass was an employee-initiated project or a project directed by Google executives. Thus, it’s not able to conclude if the “20 Percent Time” programme had an impact on the development of Glass. 

5.4.0 Alignment to Think 10X

When tasked to come up with a solution to fill the abovementioned gap between the technological and the physical worlds, Google engineers could have simply followed conventional paths and thought of how to deliver incremental innovations upon a current product related to smartphones or other prevalently used technologies. However, the principle of thinking 10X spurred them to think in a completely new direction and come up with the idea of merging the concept of eyeglasses with a computer, which no other companies have considered or attempted before, as proven by the absence of other similar products.

5.5.0 Alignment to Ship and Iterate

As mentioned in 3.0.0, in accordance to the “Ship and Iterate” policy, Brin wanted to launch Glass within as short a period of time as possible, despite its status as a prototype. Thus, Glass was released after a short development period of only 2 years with the hopes of iterating and improving on it based on feedback provided by the community.

However, one facet of the policy that Brin overlooked was to keep marketing and publicity efforts at a bare minimum during launch. Glass was introduced at a Google developers conference in June 2012 with “Glass-wearing sky divers [landing] on top of the auditorium, [racing] across the roof on bikes and into the conference hall” (Bilton, 2015). Next is to analyse how the hype generated from the event could have been detrimental in a later section of this paper. Another facet of the policy that was ignored by Google was the need to “starve the losers”, or halt any projects that were headed for failure. Even though Glass lost traction relatively quickly post-launch (D’Onfro, 2015), Google still went ahead with the expansion of the Explorers program and subsequent release to the public.

5.6.0 Alignment to Fail Well

Glass maintained its original focus of being a consumer product for 3 years before being withdrawn from the market, which is a long time given its lack of success. After being withdrawn from the consumer market, Glass was repurposed as a product targeted at businesses through the “Glass At Work” program (Google Developers, n.d.). Furthermore, the Glass team was given more legitimacy by Google, which set them up as an independent department despite Glass’ failure in the consumer market (Google Glass, 2015). It is therefore reasonable to conclude that Glass has failed well, since it was given a long time horizon, the team working on Glass was not denied advancement opportunities but rather, granted more legitimacy and autonomy, and the project as a whole was considered valuable enough for Google to salvage and repackage to serve a different market instead.

6.0.0 Evaluation of Technology Strategy

6.1.0 Technological Insights - Strengths

By basing development on technological insights, Google is well-placed to develop products that fulfill needs that even consumers are unaware of. This allows Google to build products with capabilities beyond that of their competitors and establish themselves as a market leader. This can be seen in the case of Google Chrome, where technological insights guided Google to focus on speed when their competitors were more concerned about including more features in their web browsers, since users had reflected that features were what they wanted. This unique focus set them apart from the rest of the web browser market. Chrome made users aware that speed was a desirable attribute that they wanted in their web browsers, allowing Chrome to take the lion’s share of the market within 4 years of its release.

Furthermore, developing based on technological insights also allows Google to set the direction for the market. Chrome’s focus on speed, which influenced user preferences, meant that other web browsers also had to be developed with speed in mind in order to remain relevant. Despite being a new product, Chrome was able to dictate the metrics that web browsers were assessed upon due to the leverage provided by technological insight. As a positive side effect, the increased focus on speed in the web browser market was also beneficial for Google’s core business, since faster loading times meant more searches and hence increased advertising revenue (Shankland, 2008).

In addition to the above points, technological insights allow Google to have the chance to discover new markets and hence gain first-mover advantages like brand loyalty. Gmail was the first email service to offer a large amount of storage space to users. The 1GB of space available was even doubted as a hoax when first announced, as other email services could only provide storage space of a few MB. This allowed Google to be the first entrant into the market of large storage emails (McCracken, 2014) and created brand loyalty. Even till this day, despite other email providers following in the footsteps of Gmail and increasing user email storage space, Gmail remains one of the most widely used email services with 425 million users in 2012 (McCracken, 2014) due to the consumers’ faith and loyalty to the Gmail brand.

6.1.1 Technological Insights - Weaknesses

However, technological insights can also lead to pitfalls. First of all, since there is no concrete evidence that the market supports the development of a particular product, there is always the risk that Google had identified a “false gap” and developed a product of which the idealised market does not materialise. Glass is an example of a “false gap” where Google wrongly identified a space for innovation when in actuality, the demand for such a product was not significant.

The other possible problem is that any innovative features developed through this process might simply be too complex, creating a steep learning curve for potential users, hence deterring them. Google Wave, a real time collaboration application, was Google’s answer to the question, “What would email be like if it were invented today?” (Schmidt, Rosenberg, & Eagle, 2014). Wave delivered “superb technology” (Simonite, 2011) which is a hallmark of technological insight, but was “confusing for even the savviest of users”, with some users commenting that “[they] had no idea what [they] were doing” (Ars Staff, 2010). Thus, although basing development on technological insights might allow Google to deliver technologically impressive products, such advancements run the risk of being too confusing for users to pick up easily, reducing the appeal of the product.

6.2.0 70/20/10 - Strengths

By ensuring that radical products are guaranteed, albeit limited, funding, Google gains the best of both worlds. Should the product be ultimately successful and well-received in the market, Google will stand to gain first-mover advantages as mentioned earlier. Should the product fail, the impact on Google and its organisational processes is limited since losses are restricted to a maximum of the 10% of the budget that was set out. An illustration of the separation of the budget for core and side projects can be seen by how the investment in Glass’, as well as Glass’ failure, did not affect Google’s commitment to investments in innovations surrounding its core business such as its search algorithm. In fact, the number of improvements to search increased from 665 in 2012 (Google Inside Search, n.d.) to more than 890 in 2014 (Schwartz, 2014), which was the period over which Glass was still available in the consumer market and actively improved upon. This goes to show that even though Google was investing in Glass, it was still able to proceed with investments to improve its core search business due to the proper allocation of funds.

6.2.1 70/20/10 - Weaknesses

One weakness of the 70/20/10 rule is that investments in risky projects could shake investor confidence. By putting money into “moonshots” that may not take off, investors fear that such investments are simply “adding to expenses with no hope of a financial return in the near future” (New York Times, 2015). Such fears are compounded when Google is increasing the amount it spends on research and development at a time when its revenue is not matching up to analyst expectations (New York Times, 2015). Should investors no longer be assured that Google is heading in a direction that will lead to returns for them, they may decide to not invest any more funds or even pull out. A sudden decrease in the amount of investor funds available could adversely affect Google since the amount of resources available for Google to engage in operational activities is reduced.

The feasibility of the 70/20/10 rule is also called into question should Google’s core business start to flag. Google’s investments are funded with their revenue, a large portion of which comes from their core business of search and advertising. Although this business model is still currently relevant and profitable, if Google Search was to lose its appeal  to consumers or be overtaken by competitors, Google’s revenue will be negatively impacted. There have been warning signs in the form of slowing growth in advertising revenue (Smith, 2015) and a renewed focus on advertising in major companies like Facebook (O’Reilly, 2015). Supposing that the total amount of funds available for investments is reduced, Google will need to exercise more prudence in deciding what to invest in, and how much they can afford to invest. Allocating 10% of their budget to radical projects with no foreseeable returns could be unfeasible if there is a stronger need for this money elsewhere. Thus, Google may not be able to stick to the 70/20/10 rule in the event that their core business loses its viability and overall revenue declines.

6.3.0 20 Percent Time -  Strengths

The major source of strength in 20 Percent Time is the freedom it confers upon employees. When given a chance to take ownership of their own ideas, employees will be more motivated to come up with innovative projects that reflect their personal interests. The diverse interests and skill sets of Google’s many employees mean that there is likely to be a varied pool of ideas that Google is able to develop upon. This implies that  Google is able to get ideas that would allow them to permeate markets which differ from their core business of search and advertising, thereby diversifying their portfolio. While there is no exact information about the direct impact of 20 Percent Time on Glass, it is reasonable to say that this programme helped to cultivate a creative environment that allows Google to think beyond the traditional definition of search, guiding Google towards the market of wearable technology.

Furthermore, being able to harvest ideas that can cross diverse markets facilitates Google’s efforts to be involved in multiple parts of a consumer’s life. This provide Google with more avenues to gather valuable information and craft a more complete user profile, which can then be used to improve their ability to match advertisements with their target group, hence increasing the appeal of using Google Ads to advertisers. This means that innovations in diverse fields also have the potential to benefit Google’s core business.

6.3.2 20 Percent Time - Weaknesses

One possible weakness in the 20 Percent Time programme is that even though the generation of  personal attachments to the projects can help ensure that the project is being led by someone enthusiastic about the idea, it also runs the risk of the employees being overly attached to their projects and neglecting their assigned work or even flouting Google rules and potentially laws. Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle (2014) recount an event in which the employee who initiated Gmail as a 20 Percent project went against the executives’ decision to not include advertisements next to emails. The employee went as far as hacking the internal system to implement the display of advertisements against the will of the executives. This was an act of insubordination which turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as it formed the basis for major improvements in Google’s multi-billion dollar AdSense system, but a rare exception nevertheless. Employees being personally attached to their projects can cause decisions to be obscured by emotions, leading to reckless decisions that may compromise Google’s internal systems and pose security risks.

6.4.0 Think 10X - Strengths

Allowing employees to Think 10X has helped Google retain talented employees, which is a source of competitive advantage. Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle (2014) shared the example of Mike Cassidy, a highly rated Google employee, who was given the prerogative to indulge his creative urges due to the directive to Think 10X. Although Cassidy had been expected to leave Google and strike out on his own because of his desire to experiment, Google managed to provide the necessary outlets and opportunities for Cassidy to express his creative energies. Cassidy was a project lead on Project Loon, which encouraged him to stay on and allowed Google to retain a “great smart creative” (Schmidt, Rosenberg & Eagle, 2014). Google created an environment that creative and ambitious employees could express themselves freely in and not feel stifled through Think 10X, hence retaining them and their talents.

6.4.1 Think 10X - Weaknesses

Focusing solely on trying to come up with the next big idea and outdo others, may sometimes backfire if the nitty-gritty details of the idea are not well-addressed. As in the case of Glass, Google was so enamoured by the revolutionary idea of a smart eyeglass that factors which could affect consumer reception, such as the price of Glass and the specifications it offered, were overlooked and eventually led to Glass’ failure. Therefore, although the macro view that arises from thinking 10X can allow Google to come out with radical products and be the first entrant to the market, thinking 10X may cause the team to undervalue  the importance of having a micro view to address technical details, which is also essential in determining the success of the project.

6.5.0 Ship and Iterate - Strengths

The nature of shipping out a minimum viable product and continually iterating upon it confers upon Google a great deal of agility. By reacting to user feedback, Google is able to continually make changes as befits the complexity of the market. This allows them to swiftly test and evaluate certain features and therefore improve upon or remove them entirely with ease, should the features prove to be completely undesirable. Furthermore, this allows Google to react to any moves made by competitors in a timely manner. This ability to continually update their software allows for consistent improvements to be made in Google products, which helps Google maintain or even improve upon their advantage over competing products.

6.5.1 Ship and Iterate - Weaknesses

Google’s technology strategy was originally developed with software in mind and as such, does not accommodate for the nuances in hardware development.

First of all, the ease of scaling production is much higher for software than for hardware. Since the Explorer edition of Glass was just a beta that was intended to be iterated and improved upon according to the Ship and Iterate principle, it would have been very expensive and impractical for Google to release a large quantity of Glass in the initial launch. This inadvertently caused an artificial sense of exclusivity that eventually contributed to the birth of the “Glasshole” stigma which diminished the appeal of Glass.

Secondly, Ship and Iterate hinges on the idea of continual iterations through user feedback. In the case of software, it is easy to implement measures that track the activity of the users and analyse how users react or use a particular feature. However, for hardware products, there are certain subjective issues in which feedback cannot be automatically gathered (e.g. degree of comfort, subjective preferences about ergonomics). Such feedback will have to be provided to Google via the online platforms they have set up for users, which is much more troublesome from the user’s point of view compared to automated usage patterns gathering. This means that statistically, Google will receive less feedback for hardware products that they can use for further iterations, leading to limited advancements in a particular iteration or not being able to identify what is the biggest issue that users have with the product.

Lastly, since Ship and Iterate requires the proper identification of a viable baseline prototype before shipping, there can be problems when the product is shipped too early, as in the case of Glass. It is easy to rectify any problems with software products that are shipped too early through updates and patches, but not so with hardware products. This means that wrongly identifying the standard for a minimum viable product has many more downfalls for hardware products as compared to software products, illustrating the limitations of applying Ship and Iterate to hardware innovations.

6.6.0 Fail Well - Strengths

The principle of Fail Well is closely associated with the practice of accepting, learning and gaining from failures. The term “fail well” indicates that Google is not afraid to fail so long as it is a beneficial experience from which they can either gain intangibles such as insights, or tangibles such as physical components. Even if a certain project was to fail, the employees who worked on the project would have picked up new knowledge and skills which they can then apply in future projects. Projects like Glass are also expected to leave behind valuable parts as mentioned in 5.6.0. Such valuable parts can then be salvaged and repackaged, and subsequently used in other products. Ultimately, for products that failed for reasons such as the market not being ready or the current lack of a market, Google will be in a more favourable position to conquer the market as compared to its competitors in the event that the market matures or develops later on. The knowledge and skills the employees have gained, as well as the parts left from prior attempts to enter the market, will give Google a baseline from which they can develop from, hence providing them with a head-start. Glass served as Google’s entry point to the nascent smart wearables market. This smart wearables market is starting to see growth with the introduction of products like the Apple Watch and Samsung Gear. Once the customer base for the market grows to a sizeable amount, the lessons learnt and experience gained from the Glass experiment would make it easier and less costly for Google to develop a new smart wearable product or the next iteration of Glass. In fact, Google is doing exactly that by making Glass an independent team within Google with plans to “redesign the product from scratch” (Bilton, 2015).

6.6.1 Fail Well - Weaknesses

One weakness of this principle is the lack of clear guidelines to determine when a project should be abandoned. As Google believes in giving a suitably long time frame for each project to allow the product to be refined using the Ship and Iterate approach, time is not a good  factor that can be used to judge when a project produce results by. It can even be said that each iteration that has to be improved upon can be considered a “small failure”, so long as there are still problems that have not been adequately addressed.  This is both expected and anticipated by Google. In 4.6.0, Google has said that projects can only be deemed to have failed overall when “achieving success requires multiple miracles in a row”. However, in order for Google to properly evaluate what a “miracle” is, they will have to identify certain metrics and boundaries. If these criteria are not properly defined, it can lead to errors in judgement when deciding what to cut. This can mean that a project that is unlikely to generate returns is allowed to carry on for too long a time, leading to a wastage of resources. Therefore the willingness to confer a long time horizon upon projects to give them the chance to “fail well” can give rise to some ambiguity as to when a project can be deemed to have failed and therefore abandoned.

7.0.0 Recommendations

Competitive advantage is defined as a way that an organisation can best defend itself against competitive forces. These forces are roughly divided into 5 categories: competitors, threat of new entrants, substitute products, bargaining power of suppliers and bargaining power of buyers (Porter, 1985). Google has been highly successful in establishing competitive advantages over its competitors, an illustration of which is Google’s stable position as the top search engine in the United States with a market share of 67.6% (Zeckman, 2014). Therefore our recommendations will mainly focus on how to maintain these advantages.

7.1.0 Source of Competitive Advantage #1: Patience in Technology and Innovation

Technology and innovation provides competitive advantage because it allows Google to “create new and [previously] non-existent value” (Wang, Lin & Chew, 2010). Therefore, Google products are not only substantially differentiated from competitors’ offerings, but also serve as great value propositions for customers. This greatly reduces the substitutability of the product, buyers’ bargaining power, and the threat from current competitors and future entrants.

Google’s current technology strategy allows the culture of innovation to thrive and Google already enjoys a great deal of competitive advantage from technology and innovation. As such, it would be ideal that Google continues with its current technology strategy, with one adjustment in order for them to maintain this competitive advantage. This recommended adjustment is for Google to exercise more patience before the initial round of shipping. A major reason for the failure of Glass was the eagerness of Brin to push Glass out. The team working on the product should be given more power to define the minimum viable product before shipping, since they are the ones who likely know the product best. Having a longer time to carry out more internal testing means that kinks can be ironed out in low pressure situations and properly addressed, before the product is thrown into public scrutiny which can create an immense amount of pressure on the product team.

7.2.0 Source of Competitive Advantage #2: Retaining Human Resources (and Talent)

Human resources provide competitive advantage because it is one source of value generation that cannot be easily copied or imitated by competitors (Wang, Lin & Chew, 2010). This means that being able to attract and retain more smart creatives and talented employees will allow Google to enjoy a greater deal of competitive advantage.

As explained in 6.4.0, Google’s directive of Think 10X provides the freedom for those with more ambition to realise their dreams with Google, which serves as a strong persuasive factor in talent retention. It is for this reason that Google should continue with this directive to Think 10X, and also to not over-centralise their innovation efforts within Google X. Being the dedicated innovation wing, Google X is where all upcoming radical Google products like Project Loon and self-driving cars are being developed. According to Schrage (2013), there are Google employees who feel that “Google X now owns “big think” innovation hearts and minds”. It is important for Google to not make employees feel that innovation is exclusive to Google X, for that may stifle their creativity and willingness to stay. While it’s currently unclear about internal employee movement to and from Google X, Google should keep mobility channels clear and available such that employees won’t feel like they are denied the opportunities to pursue their own “moonshots”. This means that employees, regardless of department, should still be encouraged to pursue 20 Percent projects. They should also be given the chance to transfer to Google X if their projects are worthy of further development.

7.3.0 Source of Competitive Advantage #3: Protect Branding

In a saturated market filled with many similar products or services, branding is essential to help an organisation stand out from its competitors. If every product or service on the market offers similar value to consumers, a good brand name or reputation will be the tipping factor that influences consumers to choose one product or service over another. Branding also has a compounding effect: if consumers are strongly attached to a brand, even when picking a new product or service, they are more likely to seek an offering from the trusted brand.

As mentioned in the introduction to this section, Google has created a very strong brand name for itself as a reliable search engine. Besides establishing itself as an organisation that delivers reliability, it is also well-known for delivering high quality and well-designed products such as Gmail and Google Maps. However, the failure of recent products may have hurt this reputation and the Google brand. In the case of Glass, consumers built up relatively high expectations when it was launched with much fanfare and labelled as the “next big thing” in the market of wearable computers (D’Onfro, 2015). Glass also became a coveted product due to the initial limited access that consumers had to it (only Explorers could obtain it). When issues such as bugs, the limited functionalities that Glass provided and privacy concerns arose, consumers felt that much more let-down and disappointed due to their inflated expectations. Many people ridiculed it by calling Glass owners “Glassholes” and by making other derogatory remarks. The overall negative reception towards Glass might have tainted Google’s brand by creating an association with Google that their products that are no longer reliable or of high quality.

To prevent their brand from suffering and reducing their competitive advantage, Google needs to ensure that the hype for new, and especially little-tested, products is managed well. If consumers possess only moderate expectations of the product, fulfilling their expectations would be a simpler task. Even if the product was unable to do so, the disappointment generated would also be maintained at a relatively low level, hence limiting the impact on Google’s reputation. Consumers would be less likely to associate Google with producing inferior, impractical and non-viable products that are not worth purchasing. One of the ways to manage this hype would be to control marketing and publicity efforts at launch, by maintaining them at minimal levels. Major marketing efforts should be kept until later in the product cycle when the product is able to attract users on its own merit and should be done so infrequently, to control the degree of salience of the product and efforts should be kept to a smaller scale to prevent potential consumers from expecting too much from the product. In fact, even though this act of “feeding the winners and starving the losers” is already a part of the Ship and Iterate policy, Google did not stick to it when launching Glass. So Google should be more strict about its policy when it comes to marketing launch products so as to not suffer from the issue of the product being overly hyped.

7.4.0 Source of Competitive Advantage #4: Build The Technology Ecosystem

The creation of a technology ecosystem can help build competitive advantage for an organisation. Technology ecosystems are typically “product platforms defined by core components made by the platform owner and complemented by applications made by autonomous companies in the periphery” (Financial Times, n.d.). In the case of Google, a technology ecosystem can be created by developing products or services that complement existing ones. This ecosystem can forge a continuous feedback loop in which consumers firstly begin to use products from an organisation or brand, begin to prefer using products from only that brand and subsequently opt to buy even more products due to advantages such as the ease of integrating a unified profile across various products seamlessly. Competitive advantage is hence generated.

A focus on developing products that fit into a technology ecosystem can allow Google to improve its competitive advantage. Currently, Google develops products based on technological insights. For Glass, this insight was the identification of the gap between the need to use technology and yet stay attuned to what is happening in the physical world. Google also encourages its engineers to Think 10X and come up with radical ideas. However, Google does not give their employees a clear direction to think towards. Therefore, Google should merge these aspects of its technology strategy with the overall goal of developing products that can further augment their technology ecosystem. Firstly, technological insights can be sought to identify potential gaps in the market. Next, based on this list of insights, Google can choose to develop products or services that best complement current products and services in their ecosystem. Finally, the principle of Think 10X can be applied to come up with radical solutions to fill these gaps. By developing products and services that are not only radical, but also fit into Google’s technology ecosystem, Google’s products can produce a synergistic effect that can extend its competitive advantage over rivals.

8.0.0 Conclusion

In conclusion, Glass was indeed a radical idea that suffered due to less-than-ideal execution. The conception of Glass was mainly due to Google’s technology strategy that allowed for such bold experimentation. It is also this technology strategy that has propelled Google to its current position of strength.  Hence, despite certain flaws and limitations in their technology strategy, Google will be best served by persisting with it after making some adjustments.