Apple CEO Tim Cook could end up staying at Apple through 2025
Other names mentioned include Apple’s retail chief Deirdre O’Brien, Apple’s senior vice president of Hardware Technologies Johny Srouji, 32-year Apple veteran Eddy Cue, and Chief Operating Officer Jeff Williams. If you were to look at succession by title, Williams would be next in line to replace Cook. But being only three years younger than Cook, Apple would probably turn to someone else to replace Cook.
The return of Steve Jobs fuels an extraordinary comeback for Apple
Sculley took the Apple job and soon Jobs had wished that he hadn’t. In 1985, with Mac sales declining, Sculley fired Jobs with support from Apple’s board. But under Sculley, Apple was missing deadlines and suffered through some product flops. Sculley was replaced by Michael Spindler and then Gil Amelio, but nothing worked and Apple was weeks away from a Chapter 11 filing when the purchase of NeXT returned Steve Jobs to the company he co-founded.
Jobs introduced a series of products that turned Apple’s fortunes around. There was the all-in-one iMac designed by Jony Ive. The iPod was introduced in October 2001 and sold 100 million units in six years. Two years later iTunes launched, and in January 2007 Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone. The App Store opened for business the following year, and two years later, the iPad created a new category.
It was quite a turnaround as Apple went from strength to strength. And when the time comes for Tim Cook to step down, whomever gets the CEO job will have big shoes to fill.
