Apple co-founder Steve Jobs was named “CEO of the Decade” by Fortune Magazine. The magazine calls the 2000s “the decade of Steve.”
Despite surviving a very public death watch, being tossed out of his own company in the 1980s and what Fortune calls “his own often unpleasant demeanor,” Jobs “has transformed American business.”
Apple’s come-back under Jobs spans 2000, when the company was worth $5 billion through today’s $170 billion valuation, edging out even the mega-bucks of Internet giant Google. In August, Apple reported having $31.1 billion in cash, a record for a technology company. Over that period, the Cupertino, Calif. company has become involved in music, videos and cell phones.
Unlike previous corporate titans who reshaped emerging industries – Henry Ford and the automobile, PanAm’s Juan Trippe and global airline travel and Conrad Hilton with hotels, “Jobs turned topsy turvy already existing” industries, according to Fortune.
The magazine noted Apple has received around $400 million in free publicity, thanks to the company’s well-known penchant for secrecy and Jobs’ demand for near total control – down to approving ad copy and the words he and other company executives say to the public.
In the wake of Jobs’ return this summer, much speculation centered on who might succeed the iconic Apple executive. An Apple sans Steve will likely remain vibrant, due to what the magazine calls an effort to select people who are “trained to think like Steve.”
[Via Fortune Magazine and AppleInsider]
