Eric Schmidt of Novell. He presided over a period of decline at Novell where its IPX protocol was being replaced by open TCP/IP products, while at the same time Microsoft was shipping free TCP/IP stacks in Windows 95, making Novell much less profitable. In 2001, he departed after the acquisition of Cambridge Technology Partners. Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin interviewed Schmidt. Impressed by him, they recruited Schmidt to run their company in 2001 under the guidance of venture capitalists John Doerr and Michael Moritz. In March 2001, Schmidt joined Google's board of directors as chairman, and became the company's CEO
Eric Von Schmidt and died six months later, at the age of 75. Eric Von Schmidt Eric Von Schmidt (May 28, 1931 – February 2, 2007) was an American singer and guitarist, songwriter, painter and illustrator, and Grammy Award recipient. He was associated with the folk boom of the late 1950s and early 1960s and a key part of the Cambridge folk music scene. As a singer and guitarist, he was considered to be the leading Cambridge specialist in country blues at the time, thus the Cambridge analogue of Greenwich Village's Dave Van Ronk. Von Schmidt co-authored with Jim Rooney "Baby, Let Me