Eric Schmidt is a former Google executive who has become an active voice on AI and US national security. He served as CEO of Google from 2001 to 2011 and as Executive Chairman of Google, later Alphabet, from 2011 to 2018, remaining a technical advisor thereafter.
Background
Schmidt was CEO of Google from 2001 to 2011 and Executive Chairman of Google / Alphabet from 2011 to 2018, continuing as a technical advisor after stepping down from the chairmanship.
Roles and activities
Schmidt founded Schmidt Futures, a philanthropic and venture vehicle that invests in AI-adjacent startups. He founded and chaired the Special Competitive Studies Project (SCSP), a successor to the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence (NSCAI); see Special Competitive Studies Project (SCSP). He co-authored "Superintelligence Strategy" (March 2025) with Dan Hendrycks and Alexandr Wang, which advances the MAIM deterrence framework; see Superintelligence Strategy (Hendrycks, Schmidt, Wang). He is a frequent public speaker on AI–China competition, AI national security, and compute policy.
Schmidt holds roles spanning industry, as former Google CEO; national security, via NSCAI, SCSP, and Pentagon advisory roles; and AI-safety-adjacent policy, as a co-author of "Superintelligence Strategy." His framing appears in congressional hearings, think-tank reports, and media coverage, often presented as a "serious grown-up" perspective on AI.
Positions and statements
Schmidt has publicly advocated for orbital data centers as a long-term AI-infrastructure direction (per The Information coverage, June 2025: "Why Eric Schmidt and Jeff Bezos Are High On Space Data Centers").
Footage circulating widely on May 19, 2026 showed Schmidt booed by University of Arizona graduates as he urged them to embrace AI at a commencement address. Azeem Azhar compiled the booing in his May 23 column as one of the flashpoints in what he framed as "AI backlash growing faster than revenues," describing it as the first sustained data point that pro-AI elite-establishment messaging was generating active student-cohort resistance rather than acquiescence. Azhar paired it with Rep. Ocasio-Cortez holding up a jar of mud-brown tap water (May 21) from the community around Meta's Georgia data center as a two-week flashpoint cluster. See AI Labor Disruption § "Backlash growing faster than revenues" (Source: exponentialview.co).
Relationships
- leads: SCSP, Schmidt Futures
- co-authored: Superintelligence Strategy (Hendrycks, Schmidt, Wang)
- related: Dan Hendrycks, Alexandr Wang, Google DeepMind, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), RAND Corporation.