Married billionaire and former Google chairman Eric Schmidt reportedly launched a $100 million company with entrepreneur Michelle Ritter while the two were dating.
The 66-year-old married man has committed at least $100 million to Steel Perlot, of which he is the executive chairman alongside the company’s 29-year-old CEO, Michelle Ritter, who he has been dating, according to a report by Forbes.
Barack Obama speaks with Google CEO Dr. Eric Schmidt at Google headquarters in Mountain View, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 14, 2007. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
Notably, Schmidt’s involvement with Steel Perlot appears to be the first time the former Google CEO has publicly entered into a major business partnership with someone he is dating while also being married to Wendy Schmidt, his wife of more than 40 years.
While Schmidt is typically quiet about such matters, Steel Perlot is the exception, Forbes noted. The billionaire has even reportedly “made it clear” to employees that the company is Ritter’s, and that she has full autonomy to run it.
In her role at Steel Perlot, Ritter appears to have “overstated financial commitments and overhyped involvement from industry leaders” in the company, Forbes reported.
Ritter told Forbes that Steel Perlot has multiple backers other than Schmidt, and that the company is also currently managing $450 million on behalf of institutional investors and high-net-worth individuals.
But Forbes said it was unable to find evidence that anyone other than Schmidt has ever provided significant funds to Steel Perlot. Additionally, Ritter refused to identify other investors she claimed the company had.
A company spokesperson told the outlet that Schmidt plans to continue funding Steel Perlot, and that the billionaire’s relationship with Ritter is unrelated to the business.
“We have built something within two years that I’m proud of, and there are things that I would edit,” Ritter told Forbes. “I’m really, really grateful for the great talent that we have. I’m also very grateful for the funding that I’ve gotten from friends and family, but also from Eric, who is a very significant investor at the top.”
Forbes also noted that Steel Perlot has had to hound Schmidt’s family office, Hillspire LLC, to pay its bills. The outlet obtained an email from earlier this year, in which a company executive asked Hillspire for nearly $2.5 million in order to meet payroll and credit card debts.
Schmidt, who has an estimated net worth of $26.2 billion, is one of the biggest power players in Joe Biden’s America, as documented in Breitbart News editor-in-chief Alex Marlow’s new book, Breaking Biden.
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