BackRub was initially the name of which giant tech company?

Before Google was the monolithic search engine (tech company) we know today, it was called BackRub. When Sergei Brin and Larry Page developed their computer search engine in 1996, the name they chose for it was BackRub. Their search engine relied on data derived from “back links” on the internet, hence the name. Some of their friends and graduate student work associates (Sean Anderson, Tamara Munzner, and Lucas Pereira) thought the name, BackRub, really didn't work.

After brainstorming and reviewing a number of possible new names, the new name of Google was picked for the rapidly improving computer search engine technology company. On September 15, 1997, Larry Page then decided to take all of the steps needed to register the name "google.com" as the domain name for himself and Sergey Binn. Today, Google is owned by the technology conglomerate, Alphabet which was formed in October 2015. The two co-founders of Google (Page and Binn) continued to remain as controlling shareholders, board members, and employees at Alphabet.