Google parent Alphabet Inc. said Eric Schmidt is stepping down from his executive chairman role, ending a 17-year run that saw the company grow from a web search engine into an internet giant dominating online advertising and video streaming.
In recent years, I’ve been spending a lot of my time on science and technology issues, and philanthropy, and I plan to expand that work”, said Schmidt.
Schmidt first joined Google as CEO in 2001, back when the company only had several hundred employees, and become its executive chairman 10 years later.
Alphabet, meanwhile, is expected to appoint a new chairman at a meeting next month. He will continue to serve on the company’s board, CNBC reported. It’s in the next quote from Hennessy that it’s made clear that the next role Schmidt will have wont be as involved with Alphabet as what he’d been previously.
Eric Schmidt, executive chairman of Alphabet, will become a technical adviser to the company. When Google restructured under Alphabet, he resumed that position at the parent company. “I’m incredibly excited about the progress our companies are making, and about the strong leaders who are driving that innovation”, Alphabet CEO Larry Page stated in a statement.
According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Schmidt informed Alphabet of his desire to step down on Monday.
“Larry, Sergey, Sundar and I all believe that the time is right in Alphabet’s evolution for this transition”, he said in the statement.
