[mcny]

> you can, but I am used to using uber app to call an uber.

yes, waze had 100M+ users and still failed to have a successful launch with waze carpool. part of the problem is Google is too successful. If a business makes USD 10M a year and takes up a month worth of attention every year from the Alphabet CEO, they will probably shut it down before we can say Google Product Graveyard.

[dweekly]

When I worked at Google our team came up with a data product that would have been pure margin and $75m/yr with customers lined up -- and I couldn't find a VP interested in cashing the checks because it wasn't on their annual OKRs.

Google is a great company but it has never been truly hungry because it has never faced an existential threat.

[ghaff]

It's not just OKRs. That $75m/year consumes attention all up and down and across Google. Lots of things that are slam dunks at a small or medium company are just more trouble than they're worth at most really large firms.

[hackernewds]

$75m seems like small fish, because it's a really poor monetization $/user, and opportunity cost. Thousands of ideas could generate that at Google.

Counterexample, Google Brain didn't make much money, but they still invested in it and spit out Transformers.

[stickyricky]

What's the product? Asking for a friend...

[hackernewds]

are you shouting "The Innovator's Dilemma"?