A Glimpse Inside Google

Lenoir-News Topic
A Glimpse Inside Google
By Paul Teague
Jan. 29, 2009

A pool table with the company name emblazoned on the felt. Offices designated by the names of NASCAR race tracks. And, yes, security akin to the protection of the coveted treasures at Fort Knox.

Google offered local media representatives a first peek inside its Lenoir data center Wednesday, providing a glimpse of the work - and play - of the people who are the driving forces for the Internet search and applications giant.

Located off Morganton Boulevard along Harrisburg Drive and Overlook Drive, the data center is a part of Google's planned $600 million investment in Caldwell County. From the outside, the alabaster facade is punctuated on one side by the building's intricate cooling systems for Google's banks of computer servers and an outdoor basketball hoop on the other.

Beyond the walls, the Lego-inspired colors of the company accent the railings and the furniture of the second floor home of the Googlers. A racing theme dominates the sprawling, convertible area that blurs the line between where the labor ends and the mental relaxation begins.

Google Operations Manager Tom Jacobik said the NASCAR motifs - which include sheet metal from Sprint Cup and Nationwide cars, a cutout photo of the late Dale Earnhardt and a copy machine known as Junior Johnson - serve a purpose.

"We've tried to really be adaptive to some of the things that are intrinsic to this area," Jacobik said. "This provides an opportunity to get a local feel to our area."

Jacobik noted that Google has made an effort to purchase products, including the "Google-Lenoir" felt-lined pool table, from local businesses. The catered food in the break room, delivered this day from downtown Lenoir eatery Piccolo's, also is provided by local companies. Google, which received generous tax breaks from Caldwell County, Lenoir and North Carolina to locate here two years ago, also has made itself a part of the community in other ways with grants to local charities and civic organizations.

"We're trying to keep things in the local area," Jacobik said. "It's more beneficial for us to do that. The community has rolled out the red carpet for us, and we know that."Of course, life at Google does not revolve solely around bank shots, Nerf gun battles, XBox 360 video games and Lucy, a staff member's Boston terrier who roams the floor. The employees spend a majority of their time in the intensive, in-depth world of computer code and applications processing. And what might appear to be play, Jacobik noted, also could be the inspiration to the solution of complex conundrum.

"We believe the conversations that take place (on the floor) are just as beneficial as the ones in the conference rooms," Jacobik said. "If you don't give them some other outlet, they are going to fry on what they do."

When meeting times arrive, Google personnel assemble around tables with yellow- and red-backed chairs, sort of like a grade school lunchroom for techies. Known as the Garage, the area can be cordoned off by an automatic overhead door to conduct internal seminars or video conferences with other locations in Google's worldwide network, including the mother ship in Mt. View, Calif.

The challenge for Google, as with all companies fighting through the severe national recession, is to remain on the cutting edge of the Internet age. The company still dominates Internet search, grabbing a 70 percent share of the domestic market in December, more than triple struggling rival Yahoo. Meanwhile, Google's stock price, which fell more than 60 percent from its all-time high, has rebounded in recent days thanks to another solid earnings report."We know the dynamic of technology is changing," Google U.S. Community Affairs Manager Matt Dunne said. "We need to be prepared at lightning speed."

And in examining Google's meteoric rise from a Stanford University dorm room to the pop-culture phrase, "I Googled it," perhaps the racing ideal indeed does fit. In little more than a decade, the company has lapped better-known or now-defunct challengers, many of whom arrived at the track far earlier. While the pace at first blush may seem oddly pedestrian to the uninitiated outsider, the reality of Google's turbo-charged, 24/7 operation within an ever-evolving Internet shows no sign of reaching anything close to resembling a finish line.
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