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News on August 15th,GoogleEric Schmidt, former CEO and executive chairman, previously said that GoogleAIBut he walked back those comments on Wednesday.

"I regret the misstatement I made regarding Google and its working hours," Schmidt said in an email on Wednesday.

Schmidt left Google's parent company five years ago.AlphabetIn a public speech at Stanford University, he addressed questions about how Google canOpenAICompetition issues, criticized Google's remote work policy.

In a speech at Stanford University, Schmidt said: "Google decided to prioritize work-life balance, going home early and working from home over winning the competition." He added: "Startups succeed because employees work their ass off."

This week, Stanford Online, which offers online courses, posted a video of Schmidt's speech on YouTube. As of Wednesday afternoon, the video had been viewed more than 40,000 times. It was later made private.

Schmidt said he asked for the video to be taken down and declined to comment further. Stanford did not respond to a request for comment about the video.

Google and OpenAI have both implemented similar return-to-work policies since the coronavirus pandemic. Starting in 2022, both companies will require employees to come to the office at least three days a week.

Google on Wednesday stressed the benefits of a hybrid work model, saying it would contact employees who failed to meet the three-day office week requirement to remind them of their attendance requirements.

In addition to Schmidt, many corporate executives, including JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon and Tesla CEO Elon Musk, have expressed dissatisfaction with home office policies, saying that these policies make companies less efficient and less competitive. Dimon said in an annual letter a few years ago that senior leaders cannot just sit behind a desk or in front of a screen. Musk said that employees need to work at least 40 hours a week in the office.

“Flexible work arrangements are not slowing down Googlers,” the Alphabet Workers Union, which represents more than 1,000 employees in the U.S. and Canada, said in a post on X. “Lack of staff, frequent changes in priorities, continued layoffs, stagnant wages, and lack of follow-through from management are what’s slowing us down every day.”

According to Alphabet's annual report, the company had about 182,000 employees at the end of last year.

Companies have at times struggled to get employees back to the office, with some workers complaining about long commutes and family care responsibilities. In some cases, employees have pushed back against the requests.

Schmidt told students that in the competitive entrepreneurial environment, office work is necessary for success.

"If you were going to start a company after graduation and you wanted to compete with other startups, you wouldn't have people working from home and only coming to the office one day a week," Schmidt said at the time.

Schmidt served as Google's CEO from 2001 to 2011 and stepped down as executive chairman in 2018. He left the Alphabet board in 2019. He remains an Alphabet shareholder, according to FactSet.

He co-founded the Schmidt Foundation for the Future with his wife, which funds science and technology research, and is chairman of the Special Competitive Studies Project, a nonprofit focused on artificial intelligence and other technologies in the United States.

Google has been on the defensive in the field of artificial intelligence since OpenAI launched ChatGPT in late 2022. Earlier this year, the company's Gemini chatbot was criticized for alleged bias.

The company has enhanced the functionality of Gemini and made it available on its four new Pixel phones. Its main feature is an improved voice assistant with more natural conversation capabilities. (Chenchen)