I have heard this for the last 9 months from high level insiders at Google that Eric Schmidt was on his way out as CEO.

Google co-founder Larry Page will take over as CEO. Sergey Brin the other co-founder will devote his energy to working on “strategic projects”.

Sources told me that there has been a lot of tension between Schmidt and Sergey Brin and the two have hardly spoken for almost a year.

Also, sources said there has been frustration amongst Larry and Sergey at the slow pace of decision making by Schmidt, the issues with his person life and screwing things up with Apple CEO, Steve Jobs.

In fact, in a blog post Schmidt says reasons for the move include Google wanting to “speed up decision making” and “managing the business has become more complicated“.

Eric Schmidt, will take on a new role as Executive Chairman, focusing on deals, partnerships, and government outreach. Which really means he is on the bench.