Alphabet owns Google and derives much of its value from search advertising and cloud services.
Alphabet was created in 2015 as a holding company that reorganized Google’s businesses. Google remained its largest operating unit, covering Search, YouTube, Android, advertising technology, and Google Cloud. The structure also separated several experimental or specialized projects from Google’s core operations.
Alphabet is frequently confused with Google because Google is both the principal subsidiary and the best-known brand. Alphabet’s other activities have included autonomous-vehicle technology through Waymo and life-science research through companies such as Verily.
The company’s market capitalization reflects investor expectations for its future earnings, especially in digital advertising, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence. Alphabet trades on Nasdaq under the ticker symbols GOOGL and GOOG, which represent different classes of shares.