All the best, Tim! Thank you for your service. I really appreciate you helping me transition to iPhones, especially with the iPhone X and AirPods Pro.
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Tim Cook Comments on His Final Day as Apple CEO
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Jarman74
macrumors 6502
Just for fun: what if he suffered a spectacular eleventh-hour attack of “Actually, John, I’ve reconsidered”? He has still the authority to cause an unforgettable afternoon:
To: Apple Teams
Subject: One More Thing
Team,
After considerable reflection, I have concluded that Apple should cease operations effective immediately.
We have always believed in having the courage to say no to a thousand things.
Today, we say no to everything.
I have instructed the appropriate teams to begin an orderly liquidation of Apple’s assets, intellectual property, retail operations, cash reserves, campuses, inventory, and miscellaneous office furniture.
John, please disregard the transition materials.
With all I still have and all I still am,
Tim
Naraxus
macrumors 68030
Lousy? How do you think he made Apple all that money in the first place?
Lack of innovation? Evidentially you don't consider the massive transition to Apple Silicon innovative
🙄
tcphoto1
macrumors 6502a
Tims parting gift for us are ads in Maps. He monetized Apple customers as much as he could, made maximum value for AAPL stock holders at the expense of those of us that became locked in the Apple ecosystem decades ago. I'm not a fan.
slippery-pete
macrumors 68030
Please don't bring logic into the conversation.
What is sad, majority of this board has no clue/idea what a CEO of a publicly traded company is responsible for..."did an ok job" 😂 😂 😂 😂 😂
Even though I share some similar sentiments as I'm sure many of us do, I still think Tim did the best he could, cared a lot, and he's clearly a man of character at the least. Thank you for your service Tim! Its time for a change but you set Apple up for a very strong and prosperous future. Steve would be proud, we all know preparing Apple financially for the future was a big reason why he chose Tim to lead. Some amazing products came and were developed during this era.
slippery-pete
macrumors 68030
To me, not hard to ignore the ads in Maps.
Doesn't matter what Tim did and what his successor does, people of this board will be mad/complain about it.
I will miss Tim. He was an unmatched CEO during his tenure. He will make a great Executive Chair and will hold the new CEO's feet to the fire.
Apple hasn't had a single successful product since Steve.
popltree2
macrumors newbie
My $0.02
People like to poo-poo the innovations Apple had under Tim. Granted some of the early stuff like the Watch was already in motion before he took over, but it was under him that we got Apple Watch, iPhone X, AirPod, AppleTV+, and MacBook Neo just to name a few. However, the most significant piece of technology Apple rolled out under Cook was Apple Silicon. I think we have somewhat already taken it for granted, but working on an Intel Mac today can be really illustrative of just how significant that change was.
The other thing Cook did was make Apple wildly profitable, building up cash reserves to power future innovation.
But things also got stale. While we saw things like the new (now discontinued) Mac Pro, new Mac Mini, and the introduction of the Mac Studio, a lot of Apple's product lineup hasn't changed significantly; iPhones look like iPhones, Apple Watch looks like Apple Watch, MacBook Pros look like MacBook Pros. There have been things like the transition to USB-C across the product lineup and the introduction of the 15" Air, but none of those things really have the "Wow" factor people are looking for.
With the cash they have, I'm hoping John can usher in a new wave of innovation in the company. I have a feeling we'll be seeing a glimpse of that on the 9th.
People like to poo-poo the innovations Apple had under Tim. Granted some of the early stuff like the Watch was already in motion before he took over, but it was under him that we got Apple Watch, iPhone X, AirPod, AppleTV+, and MacBook Neo just to name a few. However, the most significant piece of technology Apple rolled out under Cook was Apple Silicon. I think we have somewhat already taken it for granted, but working on an Intel Mac today can be really illustrative of just how significant that change was.
The other thing Cook did was make Apple wildly profitable, building up cash reserves to power future innovation.
But things also got stale. While we saw things like the new (now discontinued) Mac Pro, new Mac Mini, and the introduction of the Mac Studio, a lot of Apple's product lineup hasn't changed significantly; iPhones look like iPhones, Apple Watch looks like Apple Watch, MacBook Pros look like MacBook Pros. There have been things like the transition to USB-C across the product lineup and the introduction of the 15" Air, but none of those things really have the "Wow" factor people are looking for.
With the cash they have, I'm hoping John can usher in a new wave of innovation in the company. I have a feeling we'll be seeing a glimpse of that on the 9th.
CalMin
Contributor
Apple has excelled (especially financially) under Tim Cook. He was the right guy for the post-Jobs era. He wasn't trying to be Steve, he calmly, ruthlessly efficiently, strengthened operations and built up a huge war chest that positions the company for future success. With Apple silicon, they pretty much control the full stack across all product categories. People bemoan the fact that he didn't come up with the 'next iPhone' but if he had tried to do that, by recklessly trying to be the visionary that Steve was, he could well have destroyed the company. Instead, the company is worth trillions. Bravo Tim - I applaud your achievements and happy hiking when you hire that bodyguard!
It will now be interesting to see what can happen with a 'product guy' at the helm. Given that he's part of the old guard, I'm not expecting radical change here, but when the decisions are driven by product focus (JT) vs. relentless operational optimization (TC) I expect we might see more iteration and a clean up of the product lines.
E.g. iPad. We have Mini / Base / Air / Pro × three screen sizes × four processors × multiple storage tiers × Wi-Fi/cellular × several incompatible accessory families (Pencils/Keyboards). As the tech guy in the family, it's a real mess when someone asks me to recommend which iPad they should buy and what to buy with it. My perspective on this is that Cook wanted to reuse old designs to offer iPads at different price points, to enable low entry level price, and upsells with an insidious, evil genius of a price ladder. That's a sales/operations mindset, not a product focus. I hope JT sees the world differently than this.
It will now be interesting to see what can happen with a 'product guy' at the helm. Given that he's part of the old guard, I'm not expecting radical change here, but when the decisions are driven by product focus (JT) vs. relentless operational optimization (TC) I expect we might see more iteration and a clean up of the product lines.
E.g. iPad. We have Mini / Base / Air / Pro × three screen sizes × four processors × multiple storage tiers × Wi-Fi/cellular × several incompatible accessory families (Pencils/Keyboards). As the tech guy in the family, it's a real mess when someone asks me to recommend which iPad they should buy and what to buy with it. My perspective on this is that Cook wanted to reuse old designs to offer iPads at different price points, to enable low entry level price, and upsells with an insidious, evil genius of a price ladder. That's a sales/operations mindset, not a product focus. I hope JT sees the world differently than this.
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jz0309
macrumors P6
Yep, Apple is doomed, will go out of biz in no time...
What BS is that? How did that user base grow to over 1B? Cause of crappy products only in 15 years ...
turbineseaplane
macrumors Penryn
A perfect summary.
I'm more excited about Apple right now than I've been in many years.
turbineseaplane
macrumors Penryn
The changing of the guard from Tim continues.
Schiller is out as well!
Wow 😮
www.bloomberg.com
Schiller is out as well!
Wow 😮
Apple’s Phil Schiller Steps Down from Running App Store, Product Events
Apple Inc.’s Phil Schiller, one of the most visible and influential executives across both the Steve Jobs and Tim Cook eras, has stepped down from his role leading the App Store and product events.
www.bloomberg.com
ghostface147
macrumors 601
Apple kept churning out iPhones which is the money maker for Apple nowadays and all the way back to Steve's time. Even the Macs were trash until Apple HW Engineering decided to put ARM chips into the Macs instead. Apple's legacy under Tim Cook is huge opportunity missed.
Now is not the time to be a petty grinch. He left this company in a strong position, no one is perfect either. It’ll always be different from Steve Jobs as this company is not one they started but have been given stewardship over.
I agree but all I've cared about during his time is the seeming lack of quality control, just getting it right when they kept updating with bugs.
btrach144
macrumors 68040
The level of wrongness in this statement is actually devastating.