Despite the popularity of Google, a prominent section of the company will soon be closing its doors for good, according to a blog post by the company.
Google Labs which allowed users to give their feedback on prototypes before they were released as new products to the public, is being phased out. The Labs are responsible for creating popular devices such as Google Maps, Trends and Image searches, according to the International Business Times.
The news was first announced by Senior Vice President for Research and Systems Infrastructure Bill Coughran in blog post.
“Last week we explained that we’re prioritizing our products efforts. As part of that process, we’ve decided to wind down on Google Labs,” Coughran said. “While we’ve learned a huge amount by launching very early prototypes in Labs, we believe that greater focus is crucial if we’re to make the most of the extraordinary opportunities ahead.”
Despite closing the Labs, Coughran said the company will continue to be innovative with their already created products, including the new social networking website, Google+, and apps available for purchase at the Android Market website.
“In many cases, this will mean ending Labs experiments–in others we’ll incorporate Labs products and technologies into different products area,” he said.
In January co-founder of Google, Larry Page announced that he would be taking over for the companies previous CEO Eric Schmidt due to changes in the company, according to Mobiledia.
“As Google has grown, managing the business has become more complicated,” said Schmidt. “So Larry, Sergey [Sergey Briand, Google’s other co-founder] I have been talking for a long time about how to simplify our management structure and speed up decision making. And over the holidays we decided now was the right moment to make some changes to the way we are structured.”
