Alphabet Inc. was created in 2015 through a restructuring that made Google a subsidiary of a new parent company.
Google announced the Alphabet restructuring in August 2015, and the new holding company became effective in October of that year. Larry Page became Alphabet’s chief executive, while Sundar Pichai became Google’s CEO. The arrangement separated Google’s core internet businesses from several other ventures.
Google Search, YouTube, Android, and advertising remained within Google. Alphabet also became the parent for businesses and projects such as Waymo and Verily, although its portfolio has changed over time.
The reorganization did not mean that Google disappeared or that Alphabet was a replacement name for the search engine. Alphabet is the corporate parent, while Google is its largest and best-known subsidiary. Alphabet retained Google’s public-company trading history through a holding-company structure and continued to rank among the world’s most valuable listed companies.