Google co-founder Larry Page leaves Alphabet, CEO Sundar Pichai takes his spot

Google didn't have to search far for this big change in its leadership team.

Google's co-founder Larry Page will leave his role as the CEO of Alphabet, but remain on the board of the company with his fellow co-founder Sergey Brin, the co-founders announced in a Tuesday letter. Google's current CEO Sundar Pichai will take over Page's role leading the Google parent company and remain in his current job.

To make their announcement, Page and Brin circled back to some of their original founders' letters, saying how Google's 21-year history makes it a "young adult," and it's "time to leave the roost." "With Alphabet now well-established, and Google and the Other Bets operating effectively as independent companies," Brin and Page continued, "Alphabet and Google no longer need two CEOs and a president." So Pichai, who has "worked closely with us for 15 years," will assume Page's role and keep the one he's currently in.

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

It sounds like a big change for the people who had led Google since its founding, but Kara Swisher of Recode doesn't think it's such a big deal. Pichai has seemingly been the company's de facto leader "for a while" and Brin and Page "have essentially gone AWOL anyway," Swisher tweeted, largely thanks to their side projects like Page's investments in flying taxis.