AOL Names Former Google Exec as CEO

AOL is getting a new CEO. Tim Armstrong, a senior vice president at Google, will replace Randy Falco, who took the job in late 2006. Falco is leaving along with president and COO Ron Grant. The shakeup could mean that a Time Warner spin-off of AOL is more likely. Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes said Armstrong would be "helpful in helping Time Warner determine the optimal structure for AOL."  

The transition is another sign of turmoil in Time Warner's decade-long attempts to salvage its 2001 partnership with AOL, once known as America Online. The $147 billion AOL-Time Warner deal symbolized the astonishing wealth created by the dot-com boom and quickly became one of the most disastrous marriages in US corporate history. (More Time Warner stories.)