5 companies from Google and other giants that promised to be “the most successful in the world” and failed miserably

In business, as in many other things, it all starts with an idea, investing time and money in it, until you are ready to discard it and almost helplessly watch whether it swims or sinks.

Some do more than swim; they are skyrocketing, as in the cases of Facebook and Amazon.

But many fail, for a variety of reasons, and not always because they were wrong.

Technology enthusiasts often cite the case of Sony’s Betamax video system because, although widely hailed as superior to VHS, it was unable to compete with its rival due to a lack of marketing prowess.

Therefore, the other most successful companies are also responsible for some of the biggest failures. What happened?

1. Google Glass

Named one of the best inventions of 2012 by Time magazine, Google Glass was a project passionately supported by Sergey Brinco, co-founder of the search engine giant.

And it was not surprising: it was about a device that looked like something out of a science fiction movie.

They were high-tech glasses with a heads-up display where information moved along the wearer’s eye line, all activated by voice commands or gestures.

With them you would be able to find your way guided by the map that is placed on your reality; your messages would simply appear before your eyes; with just one gesture, you would take photos or film; voice command would communicate with whoever you want.

The product was born amid the clamor for laptops, something that was always on.

But while the utility and image of Google Glass were appealing, privacy concerns about the user being able to record and photograph others without being noticed proved fatal.

The idea of ​​being filmed without your knowledge proved to be too uncomfortable for people..

Businesses from restaurants to movie theaters were also not attracted to the possibility of their customers wearing camera glasses.

Three years after its launch, Google Glass has been abandoned.

The project was revived in 2017 with Glass at Work, an offering aimed not at the mass public but at companies, useful for example for providing real-time notifications in medical environments or scanning a QR code.

But attempts to revive the idea were not enough to keep it alive. In March 2023, Google put an end to its futuristic glasses.

2. olestra

Discovered by scientists from the American company Procter & Gamble in the 1960s, Olestra was a fat substitute that has not been absorbed into the body.

Tested on cakes, donuts and ice cream, it reduced the number of calories by up to 50%.

It promised to be a medicine for children, who could enjoy it without consequences, and for multinationals, who would become even richer.

But the comments on Olestra’s subsequent essays were disastrous and very distressing.

“They all had the same complaints,” explains food scientist Peter Berry Ottaway, “anal discharge that comes out of the rectum without any control“.

The product appeared to have hit a dead end, but Procter & Gamble reformulated it to focus on salty snacks and applied for US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval in 1990.

Approval came six years later, but products using Olestra had to claim that it could cause abdominal cramps and loose stools.

Consumers were initially undaunted and better medical results on side effects began to emerge.

But the ongoing loud campaign against the use of Olestra by CSPI (Center for Science in the Public Interest) and the fact that the product became the subject of jokes by comedians on American television spelled the end of Olestra.

“Really it was a public relations battlesays millionaire and entrepreneur Sam White.

Putting himself in the shoes of Procter & Gamble, he declared: “I would continue to fight.”

3. Blockbuster

Launched in 1985 in Dallas, Texas, the Blockbuster video store, synonymous with bestseller, has lived up to its name for nearly 30 years.

At its peak, in 2004. the movie rental giant once had 9,000 stores worldwide84,000 employees and nearly $5.9 billion in revenue.

But in 2000, he made a serious mistake: he missed the opportunity to buy Netflix.

The American streaming platform was founded in 1997, and began by offering a DVD rental service by mail.

Netflix offered to add a component to Blockbuster on the line to its tape and DVD rental operation, in exchange for the video company dedicating space in its stores to Netflix.

Blockbuster turned down this and another series of potential deals with Netflix, which became its main threat.

It was the defining moment of the fall.

“It’s very easy for people to get drunk on success and start believing that nothing will stand in their way, which in my experience is not the case,” notes White.

Blockbuster was interested in offering its own streaming services.

That approach changed after 2005, when media giant Viacom sold Blockbuster out of its portfolio, loading it with debt. A subsequent buyout by “activist investors” discouraged the company from innovating.

In 2010, he filed for bankruptcy.

4. Friends Reunited

Launched by computer engineer Julie Pankhurst and her husband Steve in July 2000, the Friends Reunited website helped people find their old school friends.

The forerunner of social media and the market leader in nostalgiathe site’s initial growth was extremely modest.

But after the site was mentioned on a BBC radio show, Friends Reunited took off and by the end of 2002 had attracted 8 million users.

The inevitable transition from free to paid subscription did not dampen enthusiasm, nor did the bad press, fueled by stories of old school friends having affairs and slandered teachers.

Friends Reunited remained unscathed until it was sold to British television channel ITV in 2005 for 175 million pounds sterling.

The takeover was a failure and in 2009 ITV sold the site within days 25 million pounds.

The network overpaid for the centerpiece of its digital strategy despite it being “a business that just wasn’t in the right place culturally,” according to White.

Despite his drastic turnaround in fortunes, the businessman believes that Friends Reunited “could have conquered the Facebooks of this world.”

5. Sinclair C5

The C5 electric tricycle (with pedal) was a single-seater vehicle introduced with great fanfare on January 10, 1985.

It was advertised as the future of transport: a machine that does not pollute the environment, can take the driver where he needs to go, replacing oversized and inefficient cars.

Conceived by Sir Clive Sinclair, it promised to be another of the famous inventor’s successful creations, on a par with the first electronic pocket calculator and his popular ZX Spectrum home microcomputer.

But along with the DeLorean (made famous in the “Back to the Future” movies), the C5 ended up being one of the most spectacular transportation flops of the 1980s.

However, things went downhill almost from the start.

The vehicle had problems with the image almost instantly. The press and public saw the C5 less as a new mode of transportation and more as an expensive toy.

It went from drawing board to prototype without any market research.

In addition, it was criticized for security reasons because it was extremely short, which it was practically invisible for other vehicles

The fact that it could be operated by anyone over the age of 14 without a license or helmet seemed to be a plus, but it was cause for concern.

Poor reception meant orders were minimal and production ceased around eight months later.

Despite almost universal derision, the C5 still has a cult following.

And with advances in battery technology, as well as electronic safety and stability control systems, along with an appetite for alternatives to gasoline cars, some experts wonder if The Sinclair C5 arrived 30 years ahead of its time.