Larry Page

Larry Page and Sergey Brin met in grad school at Stanford in the mid-'90s, and in 1996 started working on a search technology based on a new idea: that relevant results come from context. Their technology analyzed the number of times a given website was linked to by other sites — assuming that the more links, the more relevant the site — and ranked sites accordingly. In 1998, they opened Google in a garage-office in Menlo Park. In 1999 their software left beta and started its steady rise to web domination.

Beyond the company's ubiquitous search, including AdSense/AdWords, Google Maps, Google Earth and the mighty Gmail. In 2011, Page stepped back into his original role of chief executive officer. He now leads Google with high aims and big thinking, and finds time to devote to his projects like Google X, the idea lab for the out-there experiments that keep Google pushing the limits.