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Tim Cook Succeeded Steve Jobs as Apple CEO Nine Years Ago Today

I wonder if Apple, and Steve Job's, greatest fear was of going bankrupt like they almost did before so they picked the safest choice. I hear stories of people who started off life poor and are now extremely wealthy and they say they constantly have thoughts of losing it all. Tim Cook was the one responsible with procurement and manufacturing, and he did a good job mastering China to Apple's benefit. I mean that's what he did at Compaq, as well. But I'm sure Steve Jobs of all people must have seen there wasn't a lot going on in Tim Cook's mind regarding product development.
 
swingerofbirch said:
I wonder if Apple, and Steve Job's, greatest fear was of going bankrupt like they almost did before so they picked the safest choice. I hear stories of people who started off life poor and are now extremely wealthy and they say they constantly have thoughts of losing it all. Tim Cook was the one responsible with procurement and manufacturing, and he did a good job mastering China to Apple's benefit. I mean that's what he did at Compaq, as well. But I'm sure Steve Jobs of all people must have seen there wasn't a lot going on in Tim Cook's mind regarding product development.
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"But I'm sure Steve Jobs of all people must have seen there wasn't a lot going on in Tim Cook's mind regarding product development."

That is so funny!

Apple Watch
AirPods (and likely more wearables in the future)
HomePod
Ramping up Apple services to compensate for saturating/plateauing phone sales
Apple Silicon, with a plan to no longer be beholden to Intel's lackluster CPUs and unreliable roadmap
AR (coming soon)
 
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dapa0s said:
I think Tim has done a great job. Rip Steve
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No one can and should deny that Tim's performance. His usual operations excellence. Attracting, recognizing, and delegating to great talents. Fantastic investor performance. Successful launches of new products (e.g., Apple Watch, AirPods).

Sure he lacks charisma, technical knowledge, and visionary foresight of Steve Jobs, but few can match aforementioned excellence.
 
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nutmac said:
No one can and should deny that Tim's performance. His usual operations excellence. Attracting, recognizing, and delegating to great talents. Fantastic investor performance. Successful launches of new products (e.g., Apple Watch, AirPods).

Sure he lacks charisma, technical knowledge, and visionary foresight of Steve Jobs, but few can match aforementioned excellence.
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I wouldn't make that characterization.
 
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johnsc3 said:
Nothing on Tim; Tim is great. Not sure if Epic would have tried this ‘protest’ mess with Steve. Thermo-nuclear, effin’ war, is that what it is called?
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That Thermo Nuclear was just talk .. Steve never took the walk.
I hate to see how so many comments here are so biased and in a way undermine TIM’s ACHIEVEMENT and in massive way at that.
....and to all those who still hale Steve regardless of Tim’s EPIC performance.
Yes Steve was a genius.. so is Tim.. and no Steve did not come up or invent every idea... The Legendery Apple team did and still does ... ..Steve was a genius motivator/inspirer and amazing cherry picker and mind boggling marketer. and a micro manager( not so good)
Tim is a delegator.. A visionary in his own right...and An Absolut Brilliant CEO the world has seen very few of if any..
and thatis what is job is: CEO.. not a product designer. There is a full team dedicated to that.. and Apple products are as great as ever if not better !!!
Facts..
2011 Apple Market cap 370 billion
2020 Apple Market Cap 2 trillion
13257500-36AC-487D-9969-6AE5C4F0786D.jpeg
 
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Let’s not forget that Steve Jobs did mess up a lot of things too.
The first generation Apple TV was literally just a hard drive for your TV. You couldn’t stream, even though even back in 2007 the market was headed towards all streaming.
The iPod really didn’t take off until it was introduced with Windows compatibility, something that Steve Jobs had to be convinced to do. He was very against that idea.
The first generation MacBook Air was overpriced, super slow, it had several design flaws that made it objectively a failure.
The titanium powerbook, and even the very first aluminum powerbooks all were extremely flawed products, which had several manufacturing difficulties and problems.
iTunes Ping
The original hockey puck iMac mouse
iPod Hi-Fi
The 2008 and 2011 MacBook Pro‘s with discrete graphics cards, which had extremely high failure rates
iOS 4 on the iPhone 3G, which rendered the device Close to useless.
Mobile me, which was a failure from day one. Literally, go look back at articles from July 11, 2008 when mobile me first launched. It was a complete disaster.
The third generation iPod shuffle, which was not received well due to the lack of buttons.
 
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nutmac said:
No one can and should deny that Tim's performance. His usual operations excellence. Attracting, recognizing, and delegating to great talents. Fantastic investor performance. Successful launches of new products (e.g., Apple Watch, AirPods).

Sure he lacks charisma, technical knowledge, and visionary foresight of Steve Jobs, but few can match aforementioned excellence.
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Steve Jobs had very little technical knowledge. Go read his book, literally when they were in the garage with him and Wozniak, he was basically just a marketer. This is very well known knowledge
 
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The things that Tim Cook is good at are what is making Apple successful right now...control of the supply chain, focus on quality, all those process things, are why he was a good choice as the CEO. Visionary CEOs can really kill a company...see Jobs, Steve for an example. And, though Jobs definitely learned after his first stint at Apple, he still wasn't the greatest when it came to running the company.

The biggest failing of Apple the past few years is the lack of visionary products. Technical excellence, sure, but things that will actually change your lives, like the iPhone and iPad, those almost all came up during the Jobs era. The Watch is maybe the exception, but even that was a pretty obvious extension of the rest of the ecosystem. Though, to be fair, it seems like the health aspects of it have really grown into something that may be important, and that also seems to have been driven by Cook. What Apple really has been missing is that person who could see the niches that they could fill with something groundbreaking that would change the game...and, honestly, I think they were hampered by having Ive there, who is a good designer but not that kind of visionary even though everyone treated him like the second coming of Jobs. Apple is probably better off with him gone, really, they need some fresh designs moving forward.

The next year is really going to be an interesting one for Apple...new OS all around, the move to ARM, those are real chances to shake things up, while going into TV production and the services are either going to be smart moves to support the company or big mistakes. It's really the year for Apple to make big strides in reclaiming its mantle as the design leader in electronics, and I don't know if they have it in them. The stock will continue to do well, they will continue to be successful, but will they become the BMW and drift or have some drive? I guess we'll see.
 
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icanhazmac said:
Can't argue with Apple's financial success under Cook but I miss the Steve Jobs passion for products!
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yeah I agree, it’s something that you can feel missing when watching keynotes in recent years........

On the other hand though, I also think that we have sort of reached another “plateau” in terms of technological advancements in a way and the world/market is filled with different achievements that can be applied in different forms and shape. The tough part is how does all these tech like AR, flexible screens etc etc fit in to our world. I do believe that we will see another big leap or actual, meaningful execution of new tech in the future even though I don’t think such breakthrough would come in the next two to three years at least.......

But then hey, at least the capital they have is going keep them going for years and perhaps the next “one more thing” will really surprise us all once they figured themselves out! :)
 
Highly recommend the Steve Jobs Bio by Walter Isaacson !

It offers incredible insight into how AAPL still operates to this day, especially the first 2/3 of the book !

I've read the first 2/3 multiple times !

The book offers important insight into AAPL's hands-off Board as well !
 
ArtOfWarfare said:
Tim Cook hasn't been horrible, but he hasn't been great.

He has an intense focus on making money and has thrown the idea of having insanely great products and happy customers out the window.

If somebody wants to make a company that Steve Jobs would have been proud of (I'm sure he'd be ashamed of the monstrosity Cook has made) then that'd be the angle to go at. But we're in a post-PC world, and the post-phone world is coming.

Focus on where the puck is going, not where it is. Jump straight at AR and beat Apple with something insanely great. Give it actual killer apps that everyone needs but doesn't know they need yet - beat back the soulless crap that Apple, Google, and Microsoft will make.
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I see your point of view. You have to give anyone some credit for achieving a $2B market valuation, though. I agree there are some things, I don't believe Steve would have been okay with-- Physical size of the phone and the depreciation of features.. of the i'Work and i'Life suite speak to me off the top of my head.

Post-phone world, you I agree with you whole-heartedly; more than just services will do. However, time will tell, my friend.
 
I’m grateful that Tim knows how to make money and that Apple is doing very well. But he saves so much money that it hurts the products. I mean, the constant recycling of old parts and designs is really bad. He says that Apple is not about making the most but making the best, but I don’t think he really believes that.

I’m not sure if Apple under Steve would make x ammount versions of the same product. Steve (or Tim I’m not sure) even said, after he was asked why there is just one iPhone, that there is only one because that’s how they believe should a phone from them be like.

Who knows how successful Apple would be if they kept a simpler offering. Maybe they would make even more money.
 
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Yojimbo007 said:
That Thermo Nuclear was just talk .. Steve never took the walk.
I hate to see how so many comments here are so biased and in a way undermine TIM’s ACHIEVEMENT and in massive way at that.
....and to all those who still hale Steve regardless of Tim’s EPIC performance.
Yes Steve was a genius.. so is Tim.. and no Steve did not come up or invent every idea... The Legendery Apple team did and still does ... ..Steve was a genius motivator/inspirer and amazing cherry picker and mind boggling marketer. and a micro manager( not so good)
Tim is a delegator.. A visionary in his own right...and An Absolut Brilliant CEO the world has seen very few of if any..
and thatis what is job is: CEO.. not a product designer. There is a full team dedicated to that.. and Apple products are as great as ever if not better !!!
Facts..
2011 Apple Market cap 370 billion
2020 Apple Market Cap 2 trillion
View attachment 947199
Click to expand...

hella lucky to take over in an era of free Fed money financing his stock buybacks. Executed MBA 101 perfectly but let’s be clear, the environment has been heavily skewed to promote US tech and insulate it from hazard.

Much more impressed with how Apple got through the Ford years unscathed to be honest.
 
ArtOfWarfare said:
Tim Cook hasn't been horrible, but he hasn't been great.

He has an intense focus on making money and has thrown the idea of having insanely great products and happy customers out the window.
Click to expand...
I think you are projecting. AW and AirPods were both released post-Steve, and to me they are among the most insanely great products Apple has ever made. the current versions of the Jobs-era products like iPhone and iPad are phenomenal. The only current apple product that I’d describe as pretty lackluster is the HomePod (don’t @ me, HomePod lovers, just my opinion). but then again, Jobs had the iPod HiFi and plenty of other misses too (don’t you @ me either, HiFi lovers!). And customer satisfaction with apple’s products is extremely high, as it also was under Jobs.
 
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Feyl said:
I’m grateful that Tim knows how to make money and that Apple is doing very well. But he saves so much money that it hurts the products. I mean, the constant recycling of old parts and designs is really bad. He says that Apple is not about making the most but making the best, but I don’t think he really believes that.

I’m not sure if Apple under Steve would make x ammount versions of the same product. Steve (or Tim I’m not sure) even said, after he was asked why there is just one iPhone, that there is only one because that’s how they believe should a phone from them be like.

Who knows how successful Apple would be if they kept a simpler offering. Maybe they would make even more money.
Click to expand...
If you discuss recycling let’s start with the 5c. Steve had to have a hand in that model. So if recycling old parts is discussed, it has been seemingly a hit. New tech goes to the top end, recycled parts go to the iPhone se(2020) and some iPads. Don’t see anything wrong with the strategy as it lets Apple more easily cater to a wider audience.

Now where did the word “constant” come into play here?
 
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ArtOfWarfare said:
Tim Cook hasn't been horrible, but he hasn't been great.

He has an intense focus on making money and has thrown the idea of having insanely great products and happy customers out the window.

If somebody wants to make a company that Steve Jobs would have been proud of (I'm sure he'd be ashamed of the monstrosity Cook has made) then that'd be the angle to go at. But we're in a post-PC world, and the post-phone world is coming.

Focus on where the puck is going, not where it is. Jump straight at AR and beat Apple with something insanely great. Give it actual killer apps that everyone needs but doesn't know they need yet - beat back the soulless crap that Apple, Google, and Microsoft will make.
Click to expand...
Your Apple takes continue to be quite unimpressive, not to mention utterly wrong.
 
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