Google was founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, two Ph.D. students at Stanford University, on September 4, 1998. Originally, it was conceived as a research project called Backrub, which aimed to develop a more efficient way to index and search the rapidly expanding World Wide Web.
Page and Brin developed a new algorithm called PageRank, which analyzed the relationships between websites to determine their relevance and importance. This algorithm formed the basis of the Google search engine, which quickly gained popularity for its accuracy and speed.
Google was officially incorporated as a private company on September 4, 1998. In its early years, Google operated out of a garage in Menlo Park, California.
Google went public on August 19, 2004, with its shares trading on the NASDAQ stock exchange under the ticker symbol "GOOGL." The IPO raised $1.67 billion, making it one of the largest technology IPOs at the time.
Following its IPO, Google continued to expand its product offerings and diversify its business. The company acquired several notable companies, including YouTube (2006), Android Inc. (2005), and DoubleClick (2007).