MOST INNOVATIVE
COMPANIES 2015
3. Google
FOR
MAKING THE HIT LAPTOP NOBODY SAW COMING.
"A chintzy laptop with a browser for an operating system?
What a stupid idea." That was pretty much the reaction from the tech
community in June 2011 when Google announced Chromebooks. They were
under-specced and utterly useless without an Internet connection. Dead on
arrival. But flash-forward three years and suddenly Chromebook sales cracked
5.2 million units in 2014 alone, a number that, according to Gartner, may nearly triple by
2017.
How did it happen? Well, the OS got a lot better, and quickly.
Core applications like Gmail, Drive (formerly Google Docs), and Calendar now
work offline, making it, essentially, a fully functioning—if basic—laptop. Then
manufacturers started selling those fully functioning laptops for $300. Nowhere
has the resulting explosion been more evident than in the U.S. education
system. Schools are perpetually in need of computers, and if they can get one
that does everything students need for a fraction of the cost, it’s a
no-brainer. More than 1 million Chromebooks were shipped to the K–12 education
market in the third quarter of 2014 alone. In fact, IDC and Futuresource both recently
announced that Chromebooks have become the best-selling
device for K–12 schools in the country.
"Chromebooks were designed to make computing speedy,
simple, secure, and much more affordable for everyone," Caesar Sengupta,
VP of product management of Chrome OS, told us. "Usage is growing fast and
defying the more general decline in PC sales. It's particularly impressive to
see the education community's innovative implementations of Chromebooks in the
classroom."
Through all this, Google is getting kids hooked early on its
ecosystem, a strategy Apple used to much success in the ’80s. And it also
enables Google to eat up the low-end market, a strategy that’s led its Android
to dominate mobile OS. Sure, Apple can still strut its trendy high-end wares.
But the Chromebook is the nerdy kid everyone laughed at until she grew up and
became Jessica Alba.
BY BRENT ROSE
http://www.fastcompany.com/3039614/most-innovative-companies-2015/
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