Android’s leadership team just got another shake-up

Android’s leadership team at Google is losing another key leader. Dave Burke, the VP of engineering for Android, is “stepping away” from heading up Android engineering and is “shifting into an advisory position while exploring AI / bio projects,” he said in an email he posted to LinkedIn.

“AI has the potential to play a pivotal role in accelerating drug discovery, with wide applicability, including in hard-to-treat pediatric cancers, a topic close to my heart,” Burke said. “I’m working with Sundar to explore relevant roles at Alphabet.” Burke has been on the Android team for 14 years.

Burke’s departure follows Google’s recent move to combine its Android and hardware teams into a new “Platforms and Devices” team run by Rick Osterloh. As part of that change, Google announced that Hiroshi Lockheimer, who had led Android, Chrome, and ChromeOS, would be moving on to other projects, and Sameer Samat would become president of the Android ecosystem.

In his email, Burke promised more details to come about what’s next for his former team. “It’s important for me to leave you in good hands with a well thought out succession plan,” he said. “We’ll be following up shortly with some additional specifics about this change, so please keep an eye out for that.”

That suggests there might be more changes on the team beyond Burke leaving, and 9to5Google reported Wednesday that Google’s platforms and devices team is “undergoing a reorganization.” Google didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment about the reported reorg.