• Vista Wallpapers
• Windows Wallpapers

That question is being addressed in a report by Stephen Arnold, of ArnoldIT. Arnold made the rounds at Bear Stearns providing briefings about his report. In the report, Google 2.0: The Calculating Predator, Arnold analyzed Google’s patent pipeline and linked them to business strategies. Simply put, Arnold is trying to figure out what Google wants to be when it grows up.

We haven’t read Arnold’s report entirely (it’ll cost you $640) but enough details have emerged for discussion. We also conducted a brief interview with Arnold to fill in some gaps.

Arnold wrote in the report’s preface:

“My main thesis is that Google’s technology is special, and it makes the company a supra-national entity. Soon lawmakers will realize that Google will be challenging to regulate and control. Google’s biggest vulnerabilities are its own management who must prove it is equal to the task of creating a billion dollar company without self-destructing. Meanwhile, competitors, unable to respond technically, are making an effort to crush Google with litigation. “

A few takeaways for discussion:

Extrapolating Google’s potential business strategies takes guesswork.

In a brief about his report Arnold wrote the following:

“Traditionally, it has been difficult to get to grips with what Google is. The company is not specifically secretive; rather, it is unforthcoming about its aims, plans, strategies and ambitions. “Provide access to the world’s knowledge” is about as focused an articulation of mission as one can get from the Google people. And, from a quick outside perusal, the company seems to dabble in all sorts of technology areas and buy up all sorts of high-tech companies, which makes measuring progress or evaluating strategic orientation somewhat difficult.”

Arnold then set forth with a look at Google’s patents to try to divine a strategy. He looked at Google’s mathematics-based business, a Web-based OS, database patents, tracking technology, text processing and brokering between advertisers.

This discussion quickly puts me in a circular argument. Are Google’s potential businesses (and all the patents that go with them) the result of excess capital or some divine strategy? If the answer is yes, is it possible that Google doesn’t have this huge strategy beyond selling ads in as many nooks and crannies as it can find? If Google really has this uber strategy wouldn’t it have been articulated? A few years ago, an executive knowledgeable of Google said to me that the company often does things just to keep people (notably Microsoft) guessing and on its toes. Those comments come back to me as this Google 2.0 discussion begins.