Alphabet, the parent company recently created to keep Google’s core business separate from wilder enterprises such as self-driving cars, is preparing to ramp up its spending on its most far-out projects.
That’s what Alphabet’s chief financial officer, Ruth Porat, said Thursday on the company’s first quarterly earnings call. The most significant increase will come from the division of Alphabet working on technologies related to energy and Internet access, she said, which includes the Google Fiber project that offers high-speed, low-cost broadband in several U.S. cities.
Because Alphabet only sprang into legal existence early this month, Thursday’s call was mostly taken up with discussion of results reported by Google’s original structure, which reported a larger-than-expected profit of $4.7 billion on $18.7 billion in revenue. But Porat also said that henceforth Alphabet will report revenues, profitability, and capital expenditures for both Google and a category dubbed “other bets” that combines the company’s other businesses.
The company’s “other bets” are expected to include home devices company Nest and Google X Lab.
The number of projects and divisions under Alphabet’s “other bets” designation could expand.n projects such as self-driving cars, a life sciences group where projects include an electronic contact lens, and Google’s investment arms.