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Loon and Wing graduate from X, are now legitimate Alphabet companies
August 07, 2025
X (formerlyGoogle X) is a secretive company under the Alphabet umbrella that develops “moonshot” technology. Two of those moonshot enterprises –Loonand Wing – just graduated from X to become fully-fledged companies, standing with Google,Waymo,Google Fiber,Nest, and others.
The news comes directly from X’s CEO ASTRO Teller (or, as he prefers, “Captain of Moonshots”), who wrote about the graduations onhis Medium blog.
Loon (formerly Project Loon) is a company that brings internet service to areas where typical infrastructure is too costly, impractical, or completely infeasible. It does this by connecting wireless routers to enormous balloons that float through the stratosphere.
Wing (formerly Project Wing) is focused on developing drone delivery technology to transport physical items efficiently over long distances. The autonomous flying vehicles can take off, fly, drop a payload, and return to a destination without the need for any human interaction.
Both Loon and Wing started as humanitarian-focused projects, built on the idea that under-developed areas should have access to essential items. However, now that they are both incorporated companies, Alphabet must see profitability in their future.
Some X projects graduate under the Alphabet umbrella – like Waymo, the self-driving car enterprise – while others graduate outside of Alphabet – likeDandelion, which sells geothermal energy to customers. However, some projects never make it out of the idea phase, like the idea for aspace elevatoror the development ofpersonal jetpacks.
Unlike most development think tanks, projects that don’t make it off the ground at X are celebrated, as explained ata TED talkASTRO Teller gave in 2016. According to Teller, staff members who create projects that are killed off for whatever reason are rewarded for their “failure.”
One wonders if the developers who were integral to the success of Loon and Wing are punished for their success? Food for thought.
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