Google said January 20 that it earned $8.2 billion in advertising revenue in the fourth quarter of 2010, a 26% increase compared with Q4 2009. The company’s ad revenue jumped 23.4% for full-year 2010 to $28.2 billion.
Google’s partner sites generated $2.5 billion in revenue through AdSense in Q4 2010, a 22% increase compared with the previous year. Aggregate paid clicks, including clicks related to ads served on Google and partner sites, jumped about 18% in Q4 compared with Q4 2009. Average cost per click increased about 5% year-over-year.
Mountain View, CA-based Google also said Eric Schmidt will step down as CEO to become executive chairman. He will be replaced by cofounder Larry Page on April 4.
Google’s total Q4 revenue was $8.4 billion, up 26% compared with the fourth quarter of 2009. Total revenue for full-year 2010 was $29.3 billion, an increase of nearly 24% compared with full-year 2009. The company saw net income of $2.5 billion in the fourth quarter, up nearly 29% compared with the previous year. Full-year 2010 net income was $8.5 billion, an increase of more than 30% compared with the previous year.
“Our strong performance has been driven by a rapidly growing digital economy, continuous product innovation that benefits both users and advertisers and by the extraordinary momentum of our newer businesses, such as display and mobile,” Schmidt said in a statement.
