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Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

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Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#61

Post by harshalizee »

verelo wrote: post #43
ryandrake wrote: post #13

Cook's been great for massively scaling Apple (and its stock price) up, but the art, vision, and soul of the company is gone. It's just a stock price maximizing lawnmower now, just like every other corporate stock price maximizing lawnmower. If that's what shareholders want, fine, I guess. But I'd be bored just manufacturing the same boring rectangles every year. I think Steve would have been, too.

You forget, the camera gets better every year! I've had an iphone for 15 years. I mean, it's fine...i just wish there was incentive for durability and sustainability v's replace it every 12-24 months. I guess sustainability concerns at Apple ends at ensuring their stock price is sustainable.

What do you do with your phones that it doesn't last more than 24 months? I've had only two iPhones for almost 11 years. An iphone 6s and currently an iPhone 13 mini there entire time. They're solidly reliable

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#62

Post by usui »

welks wrote: post #52
gyomu wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Steve wanted to become chairman of the board and teach at Stanford. Given how much he trusted Tim, I’m not so sure the company would have taken a dramatically different path had he been around longer.

If he hadn't tried to self-treat his cancer with acupuncture, fruit juice and herbs, he'd probably be around now to do that. The man was clearly a lucky idiot, and shouldn't be revered, but used as a cautionary tale of unbridled arrogance.

Maybe watch this lecture by a medical professional https://youtu.be/81xnvgOlHaY before repeating a commonly-believed myth.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#63

Post by rkomorn »

welks wrote: post #52
gyomu wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Steve wanted to become chairman of the board and teach at Stanford. Given how much he trusted Tim, I’m not so sure the company would have taken a dramatically different path had he been around longer.

If he hadn't tried to self-treat his cancer with acupuncture, fruit juice and herbs, he'd probably be around now to do that. The man was clearly a lucky idiot, and shouldn't be revered, but used as a cautionary tale of unbridled arrogance.

I'd consider myself a Steve Jobs hater (and I think his treatment choices were bad) but the five-year survival rate for pancreatic cancer is in the 10-15% range.

"Probably", he'd not be around today. Even with his money, it'd be improbable.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#64

Post by paxys »

Appointing John Ternus is going to be a pretty clear indicator to investors that Apple plans on continuing its iterative hardware, supply chain and operations focus and isn't looking to shake things up from a product or vision standpoint. Which may be the best move for the company (this strategy has definitely worked wonders for the last decade and a half), but I can't help feel that among all the large tech companies Apple is the one most at risk of a major disruption. It might not come tomorrow or even in the next decade, but whenever the next shift in personal computing happens (maybe AI, maybe AR/VR, maybe something else entirely) they are going to be caught unprepared and unable to adapt in time.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#65

Post by manquer »

ryandrake wrote: post #13

Cook's been great for massively scaling Apple (and its stock price) up, but the art, vision, and soul of the company is gone. It's just a stock price maximizing lawnmower now, just like every other corporate stock price maximizing lawnmower. If that's what shareholders want, fine, I guess. But I'd be bored just manufacturing the same boring rectangles every year. I think Steve would have been, too.

> that's what shareholders want

What else could shareholders want? Employees, management, founders, customers, vendors could all have other goals, wants or desire but when you have a large number of shareholders that is what they want always.

Shareholders - a large majority of them are institutional with their own shareholders they are accountable to, always want more money - that is a core principle of capitalism.

Occasionally we can tie other objectives to financial gains to get a behave in a specific way, say a green initiative will improve the brand perception therefore brand value - because now they can charge more/ justify current pricing etc.

It can at times align the other way too for risk minimization - a founder wants a large budget for something - like say Zuckerberg with Metaverse[3], or Musk with $1T pay [2] firing the founder is more expensive[1] so shareholders sign off.

Fundamentally it always boils down to profit/value maximization for the shareholders.

---

[1] By no means unique, except for the scale of money spent on a vanity project.

[2] Firing is more expensive - Tesla trades at such crazy multiples those are arguably not viable without Musk. It is probably cheaper to give then $1T pay package or the similar $56b package from 2018 currently being disputed in court.

[3] Almost impossible in Meta's case. The board can fire the CEO in any company, but since Zuckerberg owns > 50% of the voting shares, he as the majority shareholder can also fire the board anytime and replace with a board who will sign off. It is not absolute power though, there are some protections for minority shareholders as Delaware court is showing with 2018 Musk package case.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#66

Post by mmooss »

PedroBatista wrote: post #6

The type of guy Cook is, was the “best” and safe choice for a company like Apple on the trajectory it was. Now everyone is a multimillionaire on the bank but the culture inside is quite hollowed out. Good luck for the next guy, he’ll need all of it.

Why do you say the culture is hollowed out?

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#67

Post by paxys »

jmcgough wrote: post #41

Tim Cook at Apple was like Steve Ballmer at Microsoft. They scaled the company and made stock owners happy, but weren't true visionaries. I suppose there's a need for both types of leaders.

Microsoft's stock was flat for Ballmer's entire tenure. Investors were most definitely not happy, and that was the very reason he was forced out. Tim Cook meanwhile has grown the company 10x. It's an idiotic comparison.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#68

Post by JumpCrisscross »

paxys wrote: post #64

Appointing John Ternus is going to be a pretty clear indicator to investors that Apple plans on continuing its iterative hardware, supply chain and operations focus and isn't looking to shake things up from a product or vision standpoint. Which may be the best move for the company (this strategy has definitely worked wonders for the last decade and a half), but I can't help feel that among all the large tech companie…

> might not come tomorrow or even in the next decade

…what company do you think is immune from disruption beyond the foreseeable future?

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#69

Post by tptacek »

steve-atx-7600 wrote: post #60
tptacek wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I couldn't disagree more. Some of the worst Apple computers I've owned date to the Jobs era. All of the best have been from the Cook era. Apple Silicon has been an enormous success. (My first Apple was a TiBook, for what it's worth.)

What was different in the jobs era were the goals and trajectory toward achieving them. The tibook was just a first step.

Seems like a just-so story. They shipped some rough computers over the course of that trajectory.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#70

Post by paxys »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #68
paxys wrote: post #64

Appointing John Ternus is going to be a pretty clear indicator to investors that Apple plans on continuing its iterative hardware, supply chain and operations focus and isn't looking to shake things up from a product or vision standpoint. Which may be the best move for the company (this strategy has definitely worked wonders for the last decade and a half), but I can't help feel that among all the large tech companie…

> might not come tomorrow or even in the next decade …what company do you think is immune from disruption beyond the foreseeable future?

No company is immune to disruption, but plenty of them have innovation and adaptation in their DNA. IMO over the years Apple has lost that. Look at Google, or Meta, or even Microsoft. Diversified income streams. Clutch acquisitions. Massive capital investments. Data centers. Nuclear power plants. Moonshot factories. Self driving cars. AR glasses. Robots. Venture investing and dealmaking. Massive AI ambitions. Stuff they try might not always work, and sometimes fail spectacularly, but they still do it. Apple meanwhile has been perfectly content depending on a single product and the monopolistic hold on the ecosystem of that product for basically 100% of its revenue for the past two decades.
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