Page said Pichai was the natural choice to lead Google, adding that he has “really stepped up” since October, when he took on product and engineering responsibility for Google's internet businesses. “Sergey and I have been super excited about his progress and dedication to the company. And it is clear to us and our board that it is time for Sundar to be CEO of Google,” he said in a blog post. “I feel very fortunate to have someone as talented as he is to run the slightly slimmed down Google and this frees up time for me to continue to scale our aspirations. I have been spending quite a bit of time with Sundar, helping him and the company in any way I can, and I will of course continue to do that.”
Catching the entire tech world off-guard, Google announced the birth of Alphabet, under which Google itself will become an operating unit. Not just a change of name, but a reorganisation of the company, Page, in his blog post said they wanted a “slimmed down” version of Google, with their other businesses like Life Sciences and Calico Biotech, to be their own operating companies with their own CEOs.
“We did a lot of things that seemed crazy at the time,” Page wrote. “Many of those crazy things now have over a billion users, like Google Maps, YouTube, Chrome, and Android. And we haven’t stopped there. We are still trying to do things other people think are crazy but we are super excited about.”
Alphabet Inc. will replace Google Inc. as the publicly-traded entity, the company said. All shares of Google will automatically convert into the same number of shares of Alphabet. Why asked 'Alphabet'? Page wrote, “We liked the name Alphabet because it means a collection of letters that represent language, one of humanity's most important innovations, and is the core of how we index with Google search. We also like that it means alpha-bet, which we strive for!”
