"Prabhakar has decided it's time to make a big leap in his own career," Pichai wrote in the post. "In this role, he'll partner closely with me and Google leads to provide technical direction and leadership and grow our culture of tech excellence."

The move comes as Google continues to restructure its teams to move more quickly in the artificial intelligence arms race, where it faces increased competition. The company is also dealing with several antitrust lawsuits related to its search and ads business.