Friday Fun - Is Google Worth Its Weight In Gold?
That’s the title for a recent News.com story. But I couldn’t find a literal answer in the article, so I decided to calculate it myself.
First, there’s the question of how much Google weighs - so I started from the cliche that a company is its people:
| Number of Google Employees | 7,942 |
| Average Weight: Male | 189.8lbs |
| Average Weight: Female | 162.9lbs |
| Price of Gold (per troy ounce) | $620.70 USD (12:23 ET, Nov 17, 2006) |
| Troy Ounce Conversion to Avoirdupois Pounds (regular pounds) | 14.583 troy oz. / lb |
| Ratio of Female / Male employees (estimate, based on male dominated tech industry) | 3:7 |
| Total Weight of Google Employees, based on Average Weights | 1443299.66 lbs |
| Total Value of Golden Google Employees (if Microsoft could somehow get Midas to visit Mountain View during a global all-hands meeting). | $13,064,269,491.16 |
| Google Market Cap | $151,950,000,000.00 |
So if a company is its employees, Google is worth more than ten times its weight in gold. So Midas can probably touch cubes, desks, laptops, and clothes and still be shy of the market cap.
And yes, for the retentive among us, I know that the number of employees is from June, and the gender ratio is pulled from thin air, and the market cap is rounded. It’s just for fun, folks :)
November 19th, 2006 at 9:39 pm
This is hillarious! Thanks for the detailed breakdown. You just notched up many egos with this one.
December 28th, 2006 at 9:19 pm
Google insiders have sold over $7.7B in the last 18 months or so!
http://www.secform4.com/insider-trading/1288776.htm
January 19th, 2007 at 9:56 am
…and a good way of arguing for the value of investing in great employees!