Sundar has been hired by the voting share owners, Larry and Sergey to run their company. This is 100% their fault for being uninterested in the company they control.
Sundar never "took over" in anything but a job title sense. Larry and Sergey continue to hold supermajority voting power over the company's board. The business operates the way Larry and Sergey want it to.
I think people want an excuse to justify their previous positive outlooks on Larry and Sergey by claiming something has changed. But Larry and Sergey still sit in charge of an extremely harmful company under investigation for numerous types of illegal and inappropriate conduct. Both had inappropriate relationships with subordinates that should've gotten them both fired, and both of them have yachts and/or islands that are worth more than some small countries.
Sundar was chosen following a series of failures by megalomaniacal executives Larry had appointed/approved to head various departments, including Andy Rubin, Tony Fadell, and Anthony Levandwoski. Sundar was a move in the opposite direction.
I agree with this. All investors may see is a panicking company and a leader who can't inspire or control. Get rid of Sundar. He's a peacetime CEO or a COO.
Sundar became CEO in 2015. The author quit this year. Was his "lack of visionary leadership" not that obvious for 8+ years? Or did the author stay because the stock price and his TC kept going up?
Your question implies that you think Page and/or Brin think the company is moving in the wrong direction AND Sundar Pichai is not the right leader.
Together, Page and Brin own about 14% of the publicly-listed shares and control 56% of the stockholder voting power through super-voting stock.
If anything they are supporters (and more likely, originators) of some of the changes that have been occurring over the last couple of years, including layoffs and other things people describe as “decline”.
Neither of them have to be CEO. So Page and Brin can reward the CEO for being ruthless in a down market and also have Sundar be the scapegoat for them. The “cake” is their stock going up. “Eating it too” is the CEO scapegoat.
My suspicion here is simple; they couldn't find a proper candidate who can demonstrates technological and operational leadership from both insiders and outsiders. You can simply promote either of them (usually COO suits better though), but that risks departure of another candidate, so this compromise has to be made. Anyway, this might be okay for Waymo for a short term; unlike other companies, even if those two CEO don't agree on a specific matter, there's an escalation path to Sundar (and ultimately Larry and Sergey).
If he wants day-to-day control as a founder but doesn't want to keep an ownership interest, then he can sell his shares and apply for the job of CEO. But that means he can be fired. So he wants to be CEO, not own the company, and yet nobody can fire him. The Romans had a word for that: Tyrant, with tyrannicide being a virtue. This scheme is doomed. The sooner he realizes it the fewer heads will roll during the cleanup.
Yes, this seems to be the way. Fire him, get him away from day to day operations asap. He's already off the board, so that should satisfy your investor right? Does he need to own 0% of the company to put anything more into it?
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