In a bombshell announcement, Google announced founder Larry Page will take over as chief executive officer for Eric Schmidt.

Google said Page will take charge of Google's day-to-day operations, while Schmidt assumes the role of executive chairman. Google says Schmidt will focus on deals, partnerships, customers and broader business relationships, government outreach and technology thought leadership--all of which are increasingly important given Google's global reach.

We've been talking about how best to simplify our management structure and speed up decision making for a long time. By clarifying our individual roles we'll create clearer responsibility and accountability at the top of the company. In my clear opinion, Larry is ready to lead and I'm excited about working with both him and Sergey for a long time to come, Schmidt said in an earnings release.

Sergey Brin, Google's other co-founder, will focus on strategic projects, in particular new products.

Eric has clearly done an outstanding job leading Google for the last decade. The results speak for themselves. There is no other CEO in the world that could have kept such headstrong founders so deeply involved and still run the business so brilliantly. Eric is a tremendous leader and I have learned innumerable lessons from him. His advice and efforts will be invaluable to me as I start in this new role. Google still has such incredible opportunity--we are only at the beginning and I can't wait to get started, Page said in a statement.

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