Google is one of the most fascinating companies in the history of the world.  10 years ago, it didn't exist.  Today, it has a market capitalization of $147 billion.

It does not offer traditional financial guidance and refuses to focus on the short term.  Just have a look at what they said in their S1 regulatory filing with the SEC prior to their 2004 IPO – “Although we may discuss long term trends in our business, we do not plan to give earnings guidance in the traditional sense. We are not able to predict our business within a narrow range for each quarter. We recognize that our duty is to advance our shareholders’ interests, and we believe that artificially creating short term target numbers serves our shareholders poorly. We would prefer not to be asked to make such predictions, and if asked we will respectfully decline. A management team distracted by a series of short term targets is as pointless as a dieter stepping on a scale every half hour.”

Take that Wall Street!

If you bought Google stock at the beginning of trading on its IPO day you would be up 373% today….that’s 373% in less than 3 years.

The company knows how to innovate organically - example: Google Earth.

The company knows how to innovate via acquisition - example: YouTube.

Google’s headquarters promises to be powered by solar energy sometime this Spring – so the left wing is satisfied.

Google Finance is hot and looks to displace many other financial sites as an investor’s best friend when it comes to quick and dirty equity analysis – so the right wing is covered.

Whether it is stock performance, financial performance, investor relations, product innovation, growth, how it powers its headquarters, or how it operates in today’s crazy business world….Google is a company like no other.  Love them or hate them, we can all learn a lot from Google.