Google now bigger than anything

GOOGLE IS continuing its mountaineering growth, chalking up another billion dollars in profit for its first quarter. Profit was up 69 per cent year on year and that was almost matched by revenue gains of 63 per cent to $3.7bn.

CEO Eric Schmidt said he was "ecstatic" with the numbers. So would you if you'd managed to move from the valley of doom with Novell to the infinite riches of the G-men. He should be wearing a straw hat at a jaunty angle, twirling a cane, flashing a dazzling smile at all and sundry, whistling a show tune and saying to himself, "Yup, Eric my boy, life really is pretty darn good."

Can it get better for Google? Well, Yahoo's new Panama ad system doesn't seem to be helping the firm too much, Microsoft is also becalmed and there is little sign of a killer new search technology out there.

Google's market cap is $147 billion, making it more valuable than little guys like IBM and Intel. Who knows, maybe Google will even be able to drill some holes into the Microsoft Office franchise with its web productivity programmes and find a new revenue spurt. And then watch them go. µ