She wanted to be Mrs. Schmidt.
Michelle Ritter had become used to driving around in tech billionaire Eric Schmidt’s Tesla, living in his Bel Air Mansion and conducting business meetings in a bikini – all while paying herself $1 million a year.
But it wasn’t enough for the 31-year-old mistress. After five years of being with Silicon Valley’s most eligible married bachelor and 70-year-old ex-Google CEO, she wanted him to leave his wife for her.
Instead, he terminated their $100m business relationship, triggering a lawsuit which has brought his eye-opening, unconventional, dating life under scrutiny.
The ex-Google CEO, worth $32 billion, has long been known as a Silicon Valley player, syncing up with accomplished and high-profile women.
“I know him really well – he needs a lot. He’s very open about it. He needs an open relationship,” a source close to the tech titan told The Post.
Although Schmidt has an open marriage, sources told The Post Ritter’s mistake was he’d never officially leave Wendy, his wife of 45 years.
“It’s financial. He doesn’t want to split up his money,” one insider claimed, adding: “They have a family and they have a foundation. I don’t think he wants to walk away from that.”
It is unknown if Schmidt and Wendy — who lives her own life, largely on Nantucket, devoted to philanthropy and making the island sustainable — have a prenup.
Sources claimed Schmidt also operates a hierarchy between his wife and girlfriends, which Ritter appears to have attempted to overstep.
Sources say Schmidt chooses who to take, wife or girlfriend, depending on how important the event is.
“I just saw him and Wendy at the Milken Institute in LA. They just came down from meeting with the prince of Saudi Arabia.
“At these high-level events or state visits he takes Wendy.
“To [NYC member’s club] Zero Bond, or an Oscar watching party, he’ll take his girlfriend at the time,” the source told The Post.
“In the industry, [Ritter’s] known as the tech wife. Wendy is known as the philanthropy wife.
“[Ritter] was doing all the work, but she didn’t get the recognition. She’s like, ‘Put a ring on it. People know me as your tech wife. I want to be your wife for real.’ ”
Before meeting Ritter,Schmidt had been linked to fashion designer Shoshanna Gruss, socialite Ulla Parker and Kate Bohner, a former CNBC correspondent, among others — though the splits haven’t always ended smoothly.
In a somewhat hypocritical move, Schmidt famously dumped investor and financial advisor Parker in 2019 after about a year because he got tired of her simultaneously dating hedge funder Alex Roepers, The Post previously reported.
But it didn’t stop Schmidt — four months later he was spotted at a party in Sardinia, Italy, making out with former Olympic skater Alexandra Duisberg.
The pair were rumored to be engaged in July 2019, according to Page Six , when Duisberg was seen wearing a pink, 10 carat sapphire ring. However, the relationship fizzled out.
Schmidt’s dating life has been tabloid fodder ever since Gawker published a photo in 2010 of him posing with Bohner at Burning Man — wearing a pink polo shirt and white ankle socks.
His relationship with Ritter, however, went far beyond the PDAs of his past.
He is said to have poured $100m into their failingAI startup, Steel Perlot, which has become front and center of their split.
“[Eric] was attracted to her intensity and thought she was going to be the next world class entrepreneur,” an insider told The Post.
Schmidt had first met Ritter in 2020 when she was a student at Columbia, according to tech site The Information. She is eight years younger than his daughter, Sophie, whom he shares with Wendy (the couple also had another daughter, Alison, who suddenly passed away from what their foundation described only as “a long illness” in 2017).
Schmidt’s first public outing with Ritter was in 2021, appearing at a Richard Branson space craft launch in New Mexico, which immediately set tongues wagging.
A few months later the pair launched Steel Perlot, with offices in New York and Los Angeles, which Schmidt described as “an AI and analytics company of companies,” that would invest in businesses in virtual reality, AI, space and other industries.
They launched the talent incubator at Zero Bond in Noho. Steel Perlot went on to invest millions in startups such as AI company Pyryon, payments platform Keeta and crypto trading company Tristero.
Publicly, Ritter appeared at the center of Schmidt’s circle of power players, which includes OpenAI’s Sam Altman and former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. They were also a fixture on the Hamptons social circuit, appearing at Fanatics CEO Michael Rubin’s exclusive bash.
However, Steel Perlot workers say the fading tech master and inexperienced businesswoman weren’t a great combo.
“She [Ritter] has a very hot-headed temper. She was extremely behaviorally inconsistent. You never really knew which version of her you were going to get,” a former employee told The Post.
“Other times, it was this bombastic, crazy, hyper-aggressive personality.”
Schmidt, founder of the biz, was nowhere to be found, sources say, due to his hands-off approach of letting Ritter run Steel Perlot.
“She put a bunch of crypto 23-year-olds in charge. She would hold meetings in a bikini in Miami with employees.
“Suddenly she’s making a million dollars a year and has no expenses – she thought it was always going to be a blank check.
“She allowed these inexperienced people to hire other people. On top of that there was [some people] drinking at 11 in the morning,” the former employee claimed, equating the vibe to that of the movie “The Wolf of Wall Street.”
The party atmosphere came to an abrupt end once Ritter and Schmitt broke up.
Ritter filed for a temporary restraining order against the 70-year-old tech pioneer late last year, according to bombshell court documents obtained by The Post. The restraining order was withdrawn shortly after.
There’s also a lawsuit, in which Ritter accused Schmidt of stalking, abuse and “toxic masculinity” — claiming the tech titan subjected her to an “absolute digital surveillance system” while together.
Schmidt’s lawyer didn’t provide a comment for this story. Other sources claim he’s nothing like that.
“He’s a nice hippie dad – he says yes to everything. He says ‘Yes’ to all these women. But he’s totally harmless,” said one.
He and Ritter have also sparred over cash and access to the Bel Air mansion where Ritter was living, The Post reported last week.
Ritter’s lawyer, Skip Miller, laughs off claims about the work culture of Steel Perlot, saying Schmidt’s associates are now running a scheme to tarnish her reputation.
“It’s a pack of lies, to vilify our client. Throwing mud against the wall and hoping some sticks isn’t going to win this case for them,” Miller told The Post.
He also points out how Schmidt was a big part of the company.
“It’s ironic. Eric Schmidt funded and controlled everything in the business. He’s the powerful brilliant billionaire. He called the shots. He’s trying to blame Michelle.
“It’s a smear campaign. He’s mad because she dumped him. Michelle did her job, built a successful business. She’s a competent professional person. Eric should stop spinning.”
Although some sources accuse Ritter of pulling the wool over Schmitt’s eyes over the company, the shocking performance of Steel Perlot would have been obvious to anyone involved with the business, sources claim.
The company had $61 million in operating losses and brought in less than $200,000 in revenue between its founding in 2021 and February 2024, according to financial documents reported by The Information.
In her lawsuit, Ritter said she had been locked out of Steel Perlot’s website, a strong indication she will soon be looking for a new job. There’s no word on whether Schmidt is looking for a new girlfriend.
The next hearing in their case is scheduled for Dec. 4, but it doesn’t appear the mudslinging between them will cease anytime soon.
