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Talking Schmidt: Disgusted and Embarrassed by leaks

Eric Schmidt

The massive employee wage-fixing antitrust lawsuit between several Silicon Valley companies is only getting more interesting. An email exchange involving former Google CEO Eric Schmidt surfaced last week, shining light on Mountain View’s attempt to prevent Facebook from poaching its employees. 

The exchange begins with this email sent from Vijay Gill, then an engineering manager at Google, to former senior Google engineering executive Bill Coughran and human resources executive Ivan Ernest. In a gist, it appears that Google employees had received word one of the one-hour counter-offer window.

Google Facebook Email 1

According to Quartz, Coughran passed along the email to Google’s executive management group, noting that “it seems that EMG discussions leak quickly.”

Enter an enraged Eric Schmidt, replying to the email hours later that Google should be “embarrassed and disgusted” that the information was leaked just 24 hours after he announced the one-hour window.

Google Facebook Email 2

Google now finds itself in the courtroom for these wage-fixing allegations, agreeing to a $324 million settlement.

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