Excite CEO Passed on Buying Google for $750,000 Because He "Couldn't See Much Difference." Google Is Now Worth $2 Trillion.

In 1999, Larry Page and Sergey Brin offered to sell their search engine called "BackRub" (later Google) to Excite for $1 million. Venture capitalist Vinod Khosla even talked them down to $750,000. Bell passed, claiming he couldn't see much difference between Excite's search and this new upstart's technology. His real concern? Page wanted to "rip out all of the Excite technology and replace it with Google's search." Two years later, Excite filed for bankruptcy. Google went on to become one of the most valuable companies in history, worth over $2 trillion. That $750,000 investment would be worth approximately $2.7 trillion today. In a technological bake-off, Excite's search returned Chinese web pages for the query "Internet." Google's returned pages showing you how to use browsers. Bell saw no difference. The market disagreed.