Google profit surges as UK revenues rise 19%

The internet giant reported global revenues of $10.65bn (£6.67bn) in the first quarter of 2012, a 24% increase on the first three months of 2011.

It is the third time quarterly revenues from the UK have surpassed the $1bn (£627m) mark.

The country’s Q1 revenues represented 11% of all revenues in the first quarter of 2012, level with the 11% in the first quarter of 2011.

Consistent with generally accepted accounting practices, Google reports its revenues on a gross basis, including traffic acquisition costs (TAC) or the cash shared with its partners. When TAC are stripped out, global revenues were $8.14bn (£5.1bn), up 25.6% year on year.

The average cost-per-click, including clicks related to ads served on Google sites and the sites of network members, decreased by approximately 12% from Q1 2011, and approximately 6% from the fourth quarter of 2011.

Despite the decline in cost-per-click, the number of paid clicks across Google's sites and those of its partners increased by 39% year on year in Q1 2012 and by 7% from the final three months of 2011.

The proportion of revenues from outside the US increased slightly in the first three months of 2012 – up to 54% from 53% in Q1 2011 – and totalled $5.77bn (£3.61bn) up 26.3% year on year.

Larry Page, chief executive of Google, said: "Google had another great quarter with revenues up 24% year on year. We also saw tremendous momentum from the big bets we've made in products like Android, Chrome and YouTube.

"We are still at the very early stages of what technology can do to improve people's lives and we have enormous opportunities ahead. It is a very exciting time to be at Google."

Google also announced that it plans to issue all shareholders with an additional non-voting share for each share they own, which will effectively maintain the control Google’s founders hold over the voting shares in the company.

Page and his co-founder Sergey Brin (who directs special projects at Google) said in a letter that retaining their controlling stake in the company would insulate Google from short-term pressures and allow the company to be managed for the long term.

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This article was first published on mediaweek.co.uk