Big news in the technology circle as we see Larry Page, Google CoFounder stepping down the CEO of the parent company called Alphabet. He has handed the reins of the said company to Sundar Pichai the Google CEO. So, Pichai would be leading both the companies. On the face of it, this seems to be an end of his ear, as Page has relinquished the position he has held for around four years. He has also given up his executive role for the first time since he founded the company with Sergey Brin in 1998. However, in a big way, the shift seems to have retained his status quo in the company.
Page seems to have given a good amount of responsibility to Pichai since Google was seen restructuring into Alphabet in the year 2015 and is seen stepping back both publicly and within the company in the latest years. Pichai has now overseen the Alphabet subsidiaries including the self-driving car firm companies like Waymo and the health-tech company called Calico. Although all of his so-called “Other Bets” is seen accounting for a small amount of the overall revenues of the company and costs, while it has their own individual CEOs.
The announcement from Page still has nothing to do with the power he and Brin have in the company called Alphabet. They remain in its board and also have most of the voting shares of the company. With the dual class stock structure, both Brin and Page would control 25.9% and 25.1% of total voting power of the company as of its latest filing. As per the Forbes Magazine, the voting structure of the company is not going to change with this recent development.
Having said that, Page could have lost the official role and has given the same to his successor, his role as a key corporate decision maker would hardly change. He and his founding partner will be able to approve or reject any board level decision. So, he missing out some important meetings would barely keep him accountable before the stakeholders as he is no longer the CEO which remained the case earlier. So, when we see him missing on the top tech meetings at DC with all the tech giant companies executives like Zuckerberg, Tim Cook and Bezoz attending, he missing the same will not make any senator at Washington angry. After all he is no more in an executive position and hence do not have to face the wrath of any lawmaker.