Hugo Barra, an ex Google executive and Xiaomi's vice president of international business, announced his departure from the Chinese gadget maker.
He will be leaving an important high-profile role at Xiaomi and will be looking toward India as well as other emerging markets for growth in order to compensate plummeting phone sales in China.
Hugo was the former vice president at Google and left to join what was known as a little Chinese startup in 2013.
Hugo has been in charge of the international expansion of Xiaomi since then. It is reported earlier this month that Xiaomi's India revenues have crossed $1billion in 2016, which makes the company the biggest international market.
One of the factors why Hugo is leaving is due to China's catastrophic air pollution problem. Hugo said in a Facebook post:
"What I’ve realized is that the last few years of living in such a singular environment have taken a huge toll on my life and started affecting my health. My friends, what I consider to be my home, and my life are back in Silicon Valley, which is also much closer to my family. Seeing how much I’ve left behind these past few years, it is clear to me that the time has come to return."
He added: “As I thought about this late last year, I concluded that Xiaomi is in a very good place on its global expansion path, and if there was ever going to be a good time for me to come back home, that time is now--when I can confidently say our global business is no longer just an in-house startup."
Hugo will be replaced by Xiang Wang, Xiaomi's senior vice president. He is the former Qualcomm China president and was poached by Xiaomi in mid-2015. Xiang will lead the company's entire global effort on its branding.
“We have ambitious expansion plans for 2017 and are confident in Xiang’s leadership to take our global business to even greater heights," said Xiaomi co-founder and president Lin Bin.
"As much as we would love to have Hugo stay with us in Beijing for a much longer time, we understand his personal challenges and wish him all the best in his future endeavors. I’m also looking forward to working closely with him in his new role as advisor to Xiaomi."