Friday, July 20, 2007

MarketBeat Blog - WSJ.com : Ballooning Google

Full speed ahead... maybe with an occasional speed bump.

Google shares are tumbling in late trading, losing nearly 7%, or $37, after the Internet search giant’s earnings fell short of Wall Street’s lofty expectations. Why are investors disappointed? After all, revenue pole-jumped 58% from a year ago. Maybe it’s because one of the few things outstripping Google’s sales growth are its costs. Expenses surged 69% to $2.77 billion in the latest quarter. That’s more than a few free lunches in the Googleplex cafeteria.

Yes, Google’s business continues to grow quickly and the company is taking more than its share of Web searches and online advertising. But Google is spending more and more to do it — and getting bigger and bigger. In just three months, Google added 1,548 people to its payroll — most were engineers or in sales and marketing — bringing its total workforce to 13,786 at the end of June. That’s more than three times the number of people Google employed just two years ago (4,183).

MarketBeat Blog - WSJ.com : Ballooning Google

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