Imagine trying to convince someone that Google (NASDAQ: GOOG ) was a sound
investment in 1985. Fifteen years before the brand became a big name, the
companys central product its Internet search technology would sound insane to
the average person. A computer tool that lets you search for any type of
information from any source, from a satellite map of Wisconsin, to all the
worlds libraries, to someones private shrine to their cat? It wouldve sounded
like science fiction. Today, that same search technology is the foundation of a
nearly $200 billion market-cap company. Building the consumer technology of
tomorrow is a risky business thats hard to explain, which is why the process
makes investors uncomfortable. So it stands to reason that Googles secret lab of
far-out new projects profiled in a Monday report at The New York Times , called
Google X , is just the kind of place that makes shareholders squirm. BGC
Partners analyst Colin Gillis said of the labs work, These moon-shot projects
are a very Google-y thing for them to do. People dont love it but they tolerate
it because their core search business is firing away. Some of the hundred ideas
on which Google is working sound equally as crazy today as its search technology
would have 25 years ago. Look closely, though, and you see that some of Google
Xs known projects are already growing business concerns. Here are three Google X
projects that could bolster Googles bottom line over the coming years:
Commercial Space Travel One of the projects the Google X facility is working on
is an elevator to space. While the language naturally conjures images of Willy
Wonkas Great Glass Elevator from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory , the
practical applications of rocketless space travel are far less fanciful. As MIT
professor Rodney Brooks told the Times , Google is collecting the worlds data,
so now it could be collecting the solar systems data. Beyond scientific inquiry,
though, Google also could revolutionize the lurching commercial space travel
industry. Boeing (NYSE: BA ) made headlines last year after announcing plans to
offer commercial flights on its CST-100 passenger spacecrafts a very real
competitor to Virgin Groups on-again, off-again commercial space flight program.
Google might very well be the company that finally makes upper-atmosphere
day-tripping a reality.
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