...The team of Google executives assigned to negotiate with Chinese government officials began to arrive at San Francisco International Airport two hours before their scheduled departure. The seasoned team had been briefed on Chinese culture throughout the past two weeks by a special consultant retained for the negotiations. They had also been provided with an executive summary of press coverage on China and China’s most recent policy announcements regarding the Internet. The flight across the Pacific would give the executives valuable time to prepare for the negotiations concerning the acquisition of a Chinese domain name for Google and to reflect on just how far the company had come. By the summer of 2005, Google had matured from a cutting-edge Silicon Valley start-up to emerge as one of the world’s Internet titans. In only eight years the brainchild of two Stanford University graduate students had transformed an industry and was generating impressive earnings from advertising and the licensing of its search engine technology. Google’s publicly traded stock had skyrocketed since it began trading a year before (Exhibit 1). The company was admired for its audacious goals (nothing short of organizing and providing access to “the world’s information”, its corporate principles (famously and succinctly encapsulated in three words: “Don’t be evil”, and its healthy balance sheet. By combining a Microsoft-like aggressiveness, an Apple-esque zest for innovation...
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...universally accessible and useful" Google has instilled a ‘don’t be evil” culture which showcases honest decision making and dissuades any form of cheating. (Birch, 2010). Google entered China in the year 2000 with the introduction of the Chinese version of Google. It was at this time that the internet era is China was beginning to gain momentum and the government was building the infrastructure that allowed information sources to be controlled. Google had to extensively depend upon the translation systems to make a success of Google in China but the hostile environment in 2005 made Google think otherwise .It is pertinent to state that all internet operations in China are controlled by state through some form of regulation .The following represents the presence of some MNC’s in China. Source: http://www.globalbydesign.com/wp-content/uploads/blog/china_search_cnnic.jpg Issues: I feel that Eric Schimdt Executive chairman of Google and Larry Page CEO of Google should seriously consider leaving china due to the various blockades that the government has put up for internet users .The way the Chinese government had interfered with the Gmail email system. This has been considered as a very important decision making process for Google to stay back in china or withdraw its operations in China. The loss of opportunity for Google in China would be huge considering the number of internet users and hence Google should stay back in china and tackle the Chinese dragon...
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...Case Study: “Google in China” University of Phoenix-MGT/448 November 28, 2011 Case Study: “Google in China” This case study will review and address Google’s entry into China. The following topics will be addressed: legal, cultural, and ethical challenges experienced by Google. This case study will also examine the role of China’s government in Google’s decision to operate globally in China as well as the strategic and operational challenges faced by the management team of Goggle with their decision to operate in China. In an effort to enter business in China and gain access to the world’s largest country, Google began offering a Chinese language service in 2000 from operations in the United States. In 2002, the Google site was blocked by the Chinese government and users were redirected to another site (Hill, 2009). Two weeks later, service was restored with no apparent reason or understanding of why the block initially took place or why it was restored. After the Google site was accessible by Chinese users again, politically sensitive sites were still not accessible, which implied the Chinese government was censoring certain sites. Google realized the need to establish operations in China, which finally occurred in 2005, despite challenges and criticism. Challenges Faced by Google There were many legal, cultural, and ethical challenges facing Google when the decision was made to provide services to China. When Google entered China, locations and hosted servers...
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...benefits of operating in China outweighed the costs? When it comes to the benefits outweighing the cost in China from a layman perspective, one could easily say that there is no philosophical principle was adopted, but rather, common sense led them to China. Even though China may have censorship everywhere, the Chinese don't have as many regulations as they do in America or other developed nations. Workers in China earn way less and work longer hours. Google is able to buy property for less in China, too. If anything, Google actually gained money by establishing a branch in China. On the contrary, one could also say that Google’s managers adopt utilitarian approach, because according to utilitarian philosophy, “it focuses attention on the need to weigh carefully all of the social benefits and costs of a business action and to pursue only those actions where the benefits outweigh the costs” (Hill, 2009, p. 144). For Google, they have their own legitimate and logical reasons why they should keep Google’s with the censorship by Chinese government. Without a doubt, China is a huge promising and potential Internet market in the world, where Google can make a great number of profits. Also, Google top managers explain that it’s better to give Chinese users limited information than to give nothing. What’s more, Google managers argue that Google is the only searching engine in China telling users that their searching has been censored because of the government regulations (Hill 8E, p.154)...
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...Google China – Ethical Issues The Business Environment March 07, 2011 Table of Contents Preface 3 Google 4 Background 4 Google’s Philosophy 4 Google China 5 Ethical Issues 6 Conclusion 9 Annexure 10 References 10 Chinese Business Culture 10 The Great Firewall of China 11 Events Timeline 12 Preface This paper focuses on the Ethical issues pertaining to Google’s position in China around 2006. Google has been criticized for supporting the Chinese government censor policy and aiding them by restricting the anti-government information within China. Google in its quest to gain market share entered the Chinese market adhering to the Chinese government censorship policies. Google’s approach at that point in time was certainly against its corporate values and mission, hence unethical. However events of 2010 have forced Google to revisit its position and are resulted in redirecting its search engine traffic to Hong Kong. The paper provides a brief background to the Google, Chinese business culture, censorship policies in China and Google’s approach to enter the Chinese market. Later sections of the paper look at the ethical and unethical practices of Google in line with its corporate value, mission and strategies. Google Background Since its inception in 1996, Google has grown by leaps and bounds. From offering search in a single language it now offer dozens of products and services in many different languages. Starting from two computer science...
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...Google in China Cohort Manara Google In China Corporate Social Responsibility Professor Kenny Tang HULT International Business School Module B Submitted By: Manara Team 10 Hafswa Salim Adriéne T. Smith Ornella Anoh Aravind Sathyanandham Yogesh Ranwa Samer Abou Fakher March 9th, 2014 1 Team 10...
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...An Analysis of The Case Study of Google’s Move Out of China An Explanation of the Problem Google is an American multinational Internet Corporation that was founded by Sergey Brin and Larry Page. When Google entered the Chinese market, censorship frequently interrupted its service. China has always been a relatively closed society and the government has tried to keep control on what its citizens’ experience on the Internet and social media. Google could not accept the government’s censorship; the company believed that its right of freedom of speech was being violated and its motto, “Don’t be evil,” was being conflicted with. Moreover, Google was also concerned that the government was behind cyber attacks attempting to access the accounts of Chinese human rights activists. When the conflict between Google and the Chinese government became more severe, in 2010, Google announced that it had stopped censoring its search services, had left the mainland, and had moved its search engine services to Hong Kong. Since Google did this, there has been a heated discussion about Google’s decision. Gains by pulling out of China： Google insists on its principle of “Don’t be evil,” which is the informal corporate motto of their company. The company claims that, as part of their self-proclaimed core values, “Don’t be evil.” is a central pillar of their identity. Moreover, according to Ovide (2011),"Don't be evil," is a part of their Core Values: "Do the right thing: don't be evil. Honesty and...
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...Dominant Brand -Google in China By Qu Chen 0544631 RELS 2250 Business Ethics November 4thc, 2014 Introduction As we all know, Google is the world’s most demanding search engine, which is one of the largest information technology companies that based their production and processes through the use of internet. Now, Google is not just a search engine anymore, it also offers online productivity software including Gmail, a cloud storage service, such as Google Drive, an Google Docs and a social networking service Google+. Desktop products include applications for web browsing, organizing and editing photos, and instant messaging. However, some of the popular products of Google are the Google web search engine, Goggle product search, Google Map, GMail, Google Video, and more. In fact, The Company started as a research project by two PhD Larry Page and Sergey Brin students in Stanford University of California in 1996. (Google Campany) Google Inc. has many company locations but their main office is located in Mountain View, California. The main office of Google is more popularly known as Googolplex. (Google Campany) Development of Google According to the webpage of Google, there mission is to make a system that will ease everybody when they want to search for something. Google wants to systematize every information in the world as well make it universally assessable and user friendly to everyone. The vision of Google is to make the company known as the “The perfect...
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...that took place between Google and the Chinese government to allow their citizens access to Chinese version of Google. Google looking at vast business opportunities in China as a long-term strategy. Due to its population size and market potential, China has become an attractive market for many USA and multinational companies. But Chinese government had censorship demand to Google that created some problems with opening Google search engine in China. * In 2002 Google was blocked in China. It all happened because of Chinese culture and maybe of political views. Co-founder of Google Sergey Brin began to read a dozen books to know this country. And then Google was restored for unknown reasons but Chinese users faced another problem – censorship. Chinese government very aggressively began to censor Google’s search results. Google censored some historical moments, political topics such as democratic reform, Taiwanese independence, the banned Falun Gong movement and references to the notorious Tiananmen Square massacre of democratic protestors that occurred in 1989. After that the human rights activists protested against Google. Their argument was that Google abandoned it principals in order to make higher profits. * Explanation of implication of issues and problem for affected parties is simple. Google wanted to operate in China due to its economy and market potential and don’t wanted to lag behind of its opponents Yahoo and MSN. And Chinese government due to its political...
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...considered internet to be the greatest innovation of modern’s time. Suppose the facility of internet given to us taken by someone forcibly, then imagine our life without it. In recent development china and iran have restricted the information flow throughout their country, specially china have ban Google-universal search engine and email in its country. Firstly question arises why any country will ban if internet is so useful. There lots of hidden agenda of the govt that has to be protected, if there is free flow of information is there public start questioning on the procedures of govt work. Internet censorship in China is among the most stringent in the world. The government blocks Web sites that discuss the Dalai Lama, the 1989 crackdown on Tiananmen Square protesters, Falun Gong, the banned spiritual movement, and other Internet sites The government’s computers intercept incoming data and compare it against an ever-changing list of banned keywords or Web sites, screening out even more information. The motive is often obvious: Since late 2010, the censors have prevented Google searches of the English word “freedom.” In March 2011, Google accused the Chinese government of disrupting its Gmail service in the country and making it appear as if technical problems at Google — not government intervention — were to blame. At the same time, several popular virtual private-network services, or V.P.N.’s, designed to evade the government’s computerized censors, have been crippled. V.P...
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...Google in China’s World Lauri Mak Ottawa University October 19, 2012 Abstract This paper will discuss Google, one of the largest internet search engines decision to enter the China internet market and the deviation against their very own corporate ethics policies. It will identify the key stakeholders involved and will look at the primary non-marketing issues and analysis each issue. Introduction In 1996 Larry Page and Sergey Brin began developing a search engine called BackRub while enrolled at Stanford University. In 1998 the company was renamed Google Incorporated and launched their search engine from a garage in Santa Margarita California. First held as a private company, they went public in August of 2004. Google grew extremely quickly by taking their single language website and adding different products including but not limited to the development of various forms of advertising and web applications from a variety of different tasks as found on the company website http://Google.com. Google.com quickly grew to be the most popular search engine in the world. “Their technology used an algorithm to find possible Web pages with search criteria provided by the user. Google’s PageRanktm technology measures the importance of different Web pages by solving an equation with more than 500 million variables and 2 billion terms.” (Martin, 2011) Google’s decision to enter the Chinese market was based on greed and increased market share rather than their company’s highly publicized...
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...regulatory environment in China and its implications for the chinese media. In light of the restrictions imposed by the Chinese government of internet access, how do you think the media industry is affected? On google agreeing to ensure its search content, Reporters without borders commented, “Google’s statement about respecting online privacy are the height of hypocrisy in view of its strategy in China.” However, Google’s Director of Research was of the view, “What’s important to users is access to information, we are giving them that, and we think that’s the most important.” Do you think Google was right in taking this step? Justify your answer. PPPPPPPPPPP Internet censorship Increasingly, Chinese and Tibetan citizens both inside and outside areas of Chinese Government control are seeking information through the internet and other forms of online media. The speed and bredth of information access which these mediums allow is a huge threat to the Chinese Government as they attempt to maintain propagandist views of 'sensitive issues' such as human rights, the Tinananmen Square massacre and Tibet. As such, the Chinese Government goes to great lengths to control the internet and to limit the amount of information its citizens are able to uncover. On 13 January 2010, Google announced that it would consider pulling out of China after it emerged that hackers had been attempting to access the Gmail accounts of human rights activists. Google instead decided to drop...
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...Case Study of Google in China Case Study of Google in China The SEO Consultants (2010) website highlights Google as the number one leading internet search engine within the United States today. In earlier years, the managers’ of Google recognized to remain competitive they needed to enter into the international territory of China. Shortly after launching the search engine in China from the home base of the U.S., the Chinese government blocked the site to prevent users from access to information the government deemed should be censored. Once unblocked, the government censored the search results users of China received. Google management determined they needed to base an operation center within China to better service users and fully tap into this market; however, there were many hurdles including values and ethics that needed consideration (Hill, 2009). Legal, Cultural, and Ethical Challenges Google’s mantra and mission of “don’t be evil” reflects the values of the company. Originally it simply meant to always provide the end user with only the highest quality of search results, but over time the company embraced it as their way of doing business. The culture within China is very different than that of the U.S. With the company physically placing operations in China, their Chinese operations would be subject to the laws and censorship of China. This presented an ethical challenge to Google management, as their commitment has always been to provide the end user...
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...Case Study On Google in China Table of Content Background 3 Introduction: 3 Summary of Environmental Audit 4 Evaluating Current Strategy 4 Current state of Industry- 4 Product Portfolio Analysis 5 Critical Strategic Direction 6 Discussion 6 Conclusion 6 Assessment of Current Strategy 6 Recommendation 7 New strategic Direction/Development and methods- 7 References/Bibliography 8 Appendix 9 Background: This case briefly discusses about search engine market in China, Google’s share in Chinese market, Government rules and regulations related to the internet search. The main issues discussed in this case study are: • Google’s launch in the China and how it made its presence felt over there as well as the key issues faced by the Google such as gaining the market share, although Google did a fair amount of research before entering China but still wasn’t able to beat the local competitor Baidu which is the biggest in terms of search engine in China and accounts for nearly 60% of the market share.(Appendix 4) • Chinese Government rules and regulations related to the censorship in China which was against the Google’s Mission of providing the information. • Cyber attack on Google China which mainly target the gmail accounts of the users who were Human Right activists which forced Google on considering its exit from China. • A brief...
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...Case A: 1.) Why did Google issue the statement of Jan’12? Google has issued the statement because they were unwilling to except the fact that they have to censor the content provided by them in China. The Chinese government actually wants them to control the information instead of monitoring politically objectionable information, which violates the mission and principal of the company – To organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful and do no evil. 2.) Can Google take the comfort from the reactions of stakeholders so far? In my opinion, it depends on the types of stakeholders. For competitors, such as Baidu, there is no doubt that Google exiting from China is great news by getting rid of such a strong competitor. And also I don’t think the shareholders of the company were happy to see that, as the stock price of Google falling as low as $573.09 on January 13 comparing to $714.87 in December 2007 which is Google failed business in the Chinese market is an irreversible facet. But Google’s management must give investors an explanation. This is the basic ethics of corporate management in the West. More important, Google tried to give users around the world this information. 3.) Do you except Google to exit China? Yes, I strongly expect Google to exit China because first of all it is very risky to handle a Capitalistic Chinese’s government and it is also not healthy for them to strive that hard keeping in mind of the investors and...
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