[TideAd]

> "I don't think it's crazy to believe that half the white-collar staff at Google probably does no real work," he said. "The company has spent billions and billions of dollars per year on projects that go nowhere for over a decade, and all that money could have been returned to shareholders who have retirement accounts."

So, he doesn't really understand Google's dysfunction and is just guessing at the causes?

[sharpshadow]

It’s like the famous quote:“Half my advertising spend is wasted; the trouble is, I don’t know which half.”

In my opinion the money is better placed in the pockets of workers not investors.

[roncesvalles]

>The company has spent billions and billions of dollars per year on projects that go nowhere for over a decade

Also, the supreme irony of a VC saying this.

[srj]

Yeah for all the possible criticism of Google he's seriously arguing it's that there's too much speculative R&D? Generally companies become irrelevant by trying to hold onto their cash cow and not trying to reinvent / find new revenue streams.

I can think of ways I would have approached some specific instances differently (e.g Waymo), but the existence of speculative projects isn't evidence of waste. The specific callout of retirement accounts is strange too. I'm sure many institutional investors are backed by 401ks but is that actually representative? As a wealthy investor I'm guessing he's thinking more about himself and his dividend than other's retirement accounts.

[horns4lyfe]

Ya, the retirement account thing sounds to me like a lame attempt to justify his logic “for the people” or something, when his whole premise is that Google could have made a few rich people richer. I’ve honestly never hated a VC more