Editor’s Note: This list is part of our feature, “An exclusive look inside Google’s in-house incubator Area 120.”
Area 120–Google’s in-house incubator for hatching new ideas with the potential to become big businesses–has only been around for a couple of years. But it attempts to capture the entrepreneurial spirit that’s helped define Google since the start. Here are five efforts that came to be because a passionate Googler or two believed in them.
1. Gmail, 2004: This groundbreaking email service–with a then-implausible-sounding 1GB of storage–began as a one-man project by Paul Buchheit, Google’s 23rd employee.
2. Cardboard, 2014: David Coz and Damien Henry democratized virtual reality by inventing a VR headset made out of, well, cardboard–with a smartphone you already owned providing the screen and processing power.
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