【赛迪网讯】8月4日消息，据国外媒体报道，由于谷歌和苹果之间的竞争越来越直接和激烈，谷歌CEO埃里克·施密特(Eric Schmidt)已经从苹果董事会辞职。

对此，苹果CEO史蒂夫·乔布斯(Steve Jobs)在一份声明中称：“埃里克是一位出色的董事，他把宝贵的时间、才能、激情和智慧投入到苹果董事会，帮助苹果获得成功。但遗憾的是，谷歌正在进军苹果的核心业务领域，以前是Android，现在又要推出Chrome OS。由于利益冲突，埃里克必须要缺席很大一部分董事会议，这将削弱他的贡献。因此，埃里克和我们一致认为，他应该辞去董事职位。”

2006年8月，施密特加盟苹果董事会，如今已满三年。今年5月，美国联邦贸易委员会(FTC)曾调查谷歌和苹果两家公司董事会间的亲密关系是否违反反垄断法。 根据1914年的《克莱顿反垄断法》，一人不能同时出任两家相互竞争公司的董事，否则将削弱彼此间的竞争。

7月，谷歌又宣布将推出Chrome OS PC操作系统，基于该系统的上网本将于2010年下半年上市。对此，有分析师当时认为，谷歌和苹果之间的重复业务较多，这意味着两家公司间的直接竞争也日益激烈，这将迫使谷歌CEO施密特从苹果董事会辞职。施密特当时曾表示：“我会跟苹果探讨此事，现在还没什么问题。”

当前，两家公司在以下多个领域存在竞争： 1)谷歌Chrome OS与苹果Mac OS竞争；2)谷歌Android系统与苹果 iPhone OS竞争；3)移动应用平台领域的竞争；4)谷歌Chrome浏览器和苹果Safari浏览器竞争；5) Google Docs和苹果iWork竞争。

The announcement comes on the heels of an FCC investigation into Apple’s iPhone App Store that was announced on Friday evening. The subject of that investigation is nominally the rejection of a Google app, Google Voice, from the App Store, but it is really an investigation into the closed and arbitrary nature of how apps get approved for the iPhone.

In other words, Google brought down the disapproving scrutiny of the FCC onto Apple on Friday night, and on Monday morning Schmidt resigned. It is difficult not to make a connection between these two events. The FCC investigation, of course, is never mentioned in the press release (that would only invite more pesky questions from the FCC). Instead, what Steve Jobs does say in the press release is that Google’s entry into mobile operating systems with Android and desktop operating systems with Chrome OS is increasingly becoming a “conflict of interest” for Schmidt. As a result, Schmidt had to go. It also says that both executives “mutually decided” it was time for Schmidt to resign. (I can only imagine how that conversation went. Jobs: “You are going to have to resign.” Schmidt: “Okay, but can I say it was my idea?”)

Regardless of how the resignation came about (maybe it was the other way around with Schmidt telling Jobs that the two companies were increasingly coming at odds with each other), what made the two men come to grips with reality all of a sudden? If nothing else, last Friday’s letters from the FCC was a wake-up call to Apple that Google stands on the opposite side of the fence when it comes to the evolution of the mobile Web. Google wants the mobile Web to be as open as the Internet. It’s entire mobile strategy is predicated on open access for all apps, devices, and services because that creates a larger, more vibrant, and more searchable mobile Web.

Apple is not about being open. It never has been. Every app on the iPhone (all 50,000 of them) must be approved individually, for instance. This difference in approach wasn’t a problem until Google started to have mobile aspirations of its own. Asked to choose between furthering Apple’s mobile agenda or Google’s, Schmidt must choose Google’s. It is his fiduciary duty. That conflict is only going to grow. And that is perhaps why Jobs says his “effectiveness as an Apple Board member will be significantly diminished.” Also, the more they compete, the more they expose themselves to antitrust questions from the FTC as long as Schmidt remains on the board.

Schmidt had to go. Not just because of the dust-up with the FCC and the Google Voice app. But because Google has a different set of agendas which already are putting strains on the relationship. Google wants to diminish the importance of any single computing device in favor of Web apps which sit in the cloud and are accessible from all devices—mobile phones, Macbooks, Dell laptops, or whatever. As much as is physically possible, it wants to replace the operating system with the Web.

Ultimately, that is a bigger threat to Apple than Microsoft ever was.