Google, as most of you know, has their hands in many areas of technology. While they did start out as a search engine in the early days, they have branched out to creating the most popular mobile OS, creating cloud storage, and so much more. Google has ATAP as well which creates some pretty awesome products, although the most popular one there is perhaps ARA, the modular phone. Now, according to a report out of The Information, it looks like Google is looking to create their own in-house incubator, which they are currently calling “Area 120”.
The report notes that the plan for Google is to allow their entrepreneurial employees and their teams to create and work on their own ideas within Google using their support and funding. If all goes well, they can branch out, and Google would be an investor. Bradley Horowitz and Don Harrison, who are executives at the search giant, are reportedly going to manage Area 120. Information, as you might have guessed, isn’t plentiful in this report. But it does note that teams could start working in the incubator full-time after creating a business plan, and within several months they could start their own company.
This is great for Google as it means that we could see even more innovation in the tech industry. This almost sounds like Google’s 10% rule, where employees can work on things not related to their job for about 10% of their time. One of the more popular examples of this is Nat & Lo’s YouTube videos, where they go around exploring other parts of Google. They in fact told us about Marshmallow and how it came to be, late last year. This takes their 10% rule to a whole new level though.
While it’s not clear, many are suspecting that this could be a way to keep their talent within Google. The company has been losing top executives left and right as of late. Including ATAP’s head, Regina Duggan, who is staying in Silicon Valley, but heading to a close competitor of Google, in Facebook. With this incubator, we could see top talent like Duggan stay at Google, creating their own businesses, and then branch out and have Google as an investor.