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Google to float 29.04.04 (BBCNews24) close X Google to Float Google to sell $2.7bn in shares (SOURCE BBC) Google's founders are set to become very wealthy Internet search powerhouse Google has confirmed it is to float on the US stock market. The company has filed papers proposing to issue stock to raise an estimated $2.7bn (£1.62bn), documents showed. Google added it would list its shares either on the Nasdaq or New York Stock Exchange - a move experts predict could value the firm at $20bn or more. Founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page are set to become billionaires, while many workers hope for million-dollar riches. The initial public offering (IPO) will be led by Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse First Boston. Unorthodox choice But, in an unusual move, the group confirmed it would sell its shares through an auction - which will determine the final price of the offering. The unorthodox move is designed to give the general public a better chance to buy its stock before the shares begin trading. IPOs are traditionally restricted to an elite group, with the investment bankers handling the deal parcelling shares out to valued customers. Shares in the firm are expected to begin trading on the open market in the late summer or early autumn. Details of the widely-anticipated flotation emerged in papers filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Those documents also revealed key financial details about the firm, which is notorious for remaining tight-lipped about its cash situation. Profits double Google revealed it made a net profit of $105.6m in 2003, on revenues of $961.9m. This change will bring important benefits for our employees, for our present and future shareholders, for our customers, and most of all for Google users Google The web group added it had seen a sharp rise in net profits in the first three months of 2004 to $63.9m - more than double the figure for the same period last year. The documents also showed Google had cash on hand of $454m at the end of March. In a letter included with the documents handed to the SEC, the company said: "Google is not a conventional company. We do not intend to become one." "Now the time has come to move the company to public ownership. This change will bring important benefits for our employees, for our present and future shareholders, for our customers, and most of all for Google users." One big change will be that the group's financial backers and stock-holding employees could be in line for huge windfalls - at least on paper. Silicon Valley-based Google was set up in 1996 by Stanford University students Sergey Brin and Larry Page, who had met a year earlier during a research project. Google's underlying technology is still owned by the university and leased back to the firm. Competition heats up Google's position in the market place has been cemented through its search technology, based on highly sophisticated algorithms. Over the past five years this helped it to become the search engine of choice for a majority of internet users. However, the company's rivals are working hard to displace it from its dominant position. Internet portal Yahoo recently dumped Google as its search technology provider, replacing it with its own technology after buying a string of search companies - Inktomi, Altavista and Overture. Microsoft, whose founder Bill Gates has publicly acknowledged the superiority of Google's technology, says that it will overtake its Californian rival after about two years. To counter its rivals, Google in recent months launched or announced a string of services, among them the free webmail service G-Mail and Froogle, an online shop price comparison

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