in the year 1998. Larry Page and Sergey Brin, two Ph.D. students at Stanford University, developed a search engine called "Backrub" in 1996. They later renamed it "Google" and officially launched it as a company on September 4, 1998. The initial focus of Google was to provide an efficient and accurate search engine for users, and it quickly gained popularity and became one of the leading search engines in the world. Over time, Google expanded its services and product offerings, becoming a multinational technology company known for various products and services, including its search engine, advertising platform, online productivity tools, and mobile operating system.