Alphabet, Google’s new parent company, said Q1 revenues rose but losses also grew at its “Other Bets” division, the portion of the company dedicated to so-called moonshot projects like Google Fiber, self-driving cars, Verily (formerly Google Life Sciences), Nest, GV (formerly Google Ventures) and Google Capital X.
Other Bets generated revenues of $166 million in Q1, up from $80 million a year ago, alongside an operating loss of $801 million, widened from a year-ago loss of $633 million.
Alphabet posted Q1 revenues of $20.3 billion, up 17% from $17.3 billion in the year ago quarter, along with earnings per share of $7.50.
But that just missed Wall Street expectations of earnings of $7.97 per share on revenues of $20.37 billion, and Alphabet shares were down almost 6% in after-hours trading Thursday as a result.
Among some individual Google segments, its Websites pulled in Q1 revenues of $14.3 billion, up 20%, while ad revenues climbed 16%, to $18 billion.
“Our Q1 results represent a tremendous start to the year with 17% revenue growth year on year and 23% growth on a constant currency basis. We’re thoughtfully pursuing big bets and building exciting new technologies, in Google and our Other Bets, that position us well for long term growth,” said Alphabet CFO Ruth Porat, in a statement.
