Google chief executive officer, Sundar Pichai, will ascend as the new CEO of Alphabet, replacing Larry Page who stepped down from his CEO role today.
Google cofounder Segey Brin also stepped down from the presidential role at Alphabet.
“Sundar brings humility and a deep passion for technology to our users, partners and our employees every day,” wrote Page and Sergey in an Alphabet blog post. “He shares our confidence in the value of the Alphabet structure, and the ability it provides us to tackle big challenges through technology. There is no one that we have relied on more since Alphabet was founded, and no better person to lead Google and Alphabet into the future.”
Pichai, who’s 46 years old, has helmed Google for over four years and has worked with the company for more than 15 years. He oversaw the technology development as well as the operations for Alphabet’s greatest asset–Google. Unlike Page and Brin, Pichai actively stood in the spotlight, hosting major tech events such as Made by Google and Google I/O.
In the same blog post, Pichai assured that he will continue the vision set by its founders.
“I want to be clear that this transition won’t affect the Alphabet structure or the work we do day to day,” wrote Pichai. “I will continue to be very focused on Google and the deep work we’re doing to push the boundaries of computing and build a more helpful Google for everyone. At the same time, I’m excited about Alphabet and its long term focus on tackling big challenges through technology.”
In 2015, Google was rebranded to Alphabet, thus provisioning the Google brand strictly for its search engine business. Google’s rebranding also saw it branching its business into other sectors including Waymo, a self-driving car project, and Google Fibre, its high-speed internet service.
More recently and more pertinent to the Canadian market, Alphabet has been developing the Sidewalk Labs smart city project in Toronto.
In recent years, Google has received increased criticism from the public, chiefly due to its security practices and ethical controversies.
Brin and Page first launched the Google search engine concept in 1998 as a homebrew project. Since then, it has evolved into a company that generates billions from search engine advertisement. Out of its US$136.22 billion revenue, US$116 billion–or 85 per cent–came from advertisements.
Brin and Page will continue to serve on the Alphabet director board.