Alphabet Inc. is shutting down Makani, a subsidiary working on wind energy, as Google\u2019s parent company pares back its experimental technology in favor of its main internet business.<\/p>\n
Makani was formed in 2006 to make flying kites that would harness wind power and, eventually, replace more expensive turbines.<\/p>\n
Google acquired the startup in 2013, placing the group inside its X lab with other \u201cmoonshots\u201d like self-driving cars. Makani later became its own Alphabet unit.<\/p>\n
But the initiative suffered personnel problems and waning support from its parent company, which has pulled back on several green energy projects.<\/p>\n
\u201cDespite strong technical progress, the road to commercialization is longer and riskier than hoped, so from today Makani\u2019s time at Alphabet is coming to an end,\u201d Fort Felker, Makani\u2019s chief executive, wrote in a blog post. Astro Teller, the head of X, said the lab will be \u201credirecting resources to more promising areas.\u201d<\/p>\n
Royal Dutch Shell Plc, which invested in Makani, said it\u2019s exploring options to use Makani\u2019s technology. The Financial Times earlier reported the news of Makani\u2019s end.<\/p>\n
Economics didn\u2019t help Makani\u2019s commercial odds. Since it began, the cost of wind energy has fallen dramatically, making it harder to sell novel clean energy technology, said Saul Griffith, one of Makani\u2019s co-founders.<\/p>\n
\u201cVery few people have been given the opportunity to swing for the fences with regard to climate change,\u201d said Griffith, who now runs the energy firm Otherlab. \u201cThis is something they should be proud of.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alphabet\u2019s \u201cOther Bets\u201d divisions includes a handful of audacious projects, like drones and life extension. Last quarter, the company had capital expenses of $86 million on those units compared with $6.6 billion on Google.<\/p>\n
Alphabet is shutting down Makani, a subsidiary working on wind energy, as Google\u2019s parent company pares back its experimental technology in favor of its main internet business.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341034,"featured_media":288986,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[32030,167],"class_list":["post-339372","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-alphabet","tag-google"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339372"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341034"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=339372"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339372\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=339372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=339372"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=339372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}