Google Launches Venture Fund for 'Exceptional' Firms

Despite the current economic situation, Google is looking to invest in promising start ups. The search engine giant on Tuesday announced the start of Google Ventures, its new venture capital fund.
"This is Google's effort to take advantage of our resources to support innovation and encourage promising new technology companies," Rich Miner and Bill Maris, managing partners at Google Ventures, wrote in a blog post. "By borrowing the best practices of top-tier, financially focused venture capital firms and bringing to bear Google's unique technical expertise and brand, we think we can find young companies with truly awesome potential and encourage their development into successful businesses." The existence of Google Ventures had been suspected earlier this month, when a reporter caught Miner wearing a Google Ventures badge.

Google Ventures will focus its initial efforts on finding and developing "exceptional" start-ups, they wrote. That will cover a range of industries, including consumer Internet, software, clean-tech, bio-tech, and health care.

"Economically, times are tough, but great ideas come when they will," Miner and Maris wrote. "If anything, we think the current downturn is an ideal time to invest in nascent companies that have the chance to be the 'next big thing,' and we'll be working hard to find them." Those with big ideas to pitch can go to the Google Ventures Web site at www.google.com/ventures.