Updated: Nest founder Tony Fadell gives up CEO role, promises to 'disrupt other industries'

Tony Fadell, founder of Nest, is no longer CEO of the smart home firm, he announced today.

"I have decided that the time is right to 'leave the Nest,'" Fadell wrote in a blog post.

While the news may strike some as sudden, Fadell noted the leadership transition has been underway since late last year.

He won't be gone entirely from Alphabet, which owns Nest, and will take on the role of adviser to the company as well as to Larry Page. This role will allow him to remain involved with Nest, though not in its day-to-day operations.

Fadell, who's also credited as the "father of the iPod," plans to take his industry-disrupting credo outside the smart home walls: "This will give me the time and flexibility to pursue new opportunities to create and disrupt other industries – and to support others who want to do the same – just as we've done at Nest."

A new Nest

Marwan Fawaz, a Motorola exec who ran its Motorola Home business and former EVP and CTO at Charter Communications, will take on the role of Nest CEO.

Fadell founded Nest in 2011, and almost immediately its impact on the smart home space was felt. Google swooped in to buy it two years ago in a $3.2 billion blockbuster deal. It was Google's third-largest acquisition ever, and many viewed it as a match that made in tech heaven.

Nest would eventually be shuffled into Alphabet, Google's new parent company. Fadell was also put in charge of Google Glass, a device with well-documented struggles.

Nest began to have its own problems, too, including a quasi-recalled smoke and carbon monoxide detector and a slow product release cycle.

Scrutiny began to fall on Fadell, too, as reports of his difficult management style began to surface earlier this year. In March, Dropcam Founder Greg Duffy wrote a defense of his company that was damning of Fadell and other Nest leaders.

Despite its struggles, Nest has grown from its beginnings as a smart thermostat company to encompass a number of smart home products, as well as software and services. There's also the Works with Nest ecosystem that allows third-party devices to sync up with Nest products.

Losing Fadell means Nest is losing a big name that's been attached to it for six year, but it also seems poised to embrace a new future and reach the heights we've expected it to all along. With Google making more moves into the smart home, we expect Nest will be an integral part of its plans.