Apple announced today that it has finally severed ties with Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who had been on the firm's board of directors since August 2006.

The decision to cut Schmidt loose hardly comes as a surprise. In May Mountain View confirmed reports that the US Federal Trade Commission was probing whether overlapping board seats between Google and Apple might somehow stifle market competition.

At the time Schmidt said he had no intention of resigning from his post at Apple. He later confessed to mulling his future at Cupertino in the wake of Google's Chrome OS, which clearly invades Apple's Mac OSX turf.

"Unfortunately, as Google enters more of Apple's core businesses, with Android and now Chrome OS, Eric's effectiveness as an Apple Board member will be significantly diminished, since he will have to recuse himself from even larger portions of our meetings due to potential conflicts of interest," said Apple boss Steve Jobs in a statement today.

"Therefore, we have mutually decided that now is the right time for Eric to resign his position on Apple's Board."

Late last month things turned outright frosty between the once happy playmates, when Apple barred the official Google Voice application from the iPhone App Store while dumping two third-party apps that tap into Google's invite-only service. ®

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