Excite Said No to Buying Google for $750,000. Google Is Now Worth $2 Trillion.

In 1999, Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin approached Excite CEO George Bell with an offer to sell their little search engine for just $750,000. Bell said no. They came back at $1 million. Still no. Excite was focused on being a "portal" — remember those? — and search was just a feature, not a business. Excite went bankrupt in 2001. Google went on to become one of the most valuable companies in human history, worth over $2 trillion today. That $750,000 investment would now be worth... well, incalculable, since Google never sold. But for context, even a 0.01% stake in Google today would be worth $200 million. The best part? Excite's search engine was powered by inferior technology, and they knew Google's was better. They just didn't think search mattered. Narrator: It mattered.