April 10, 1985: During a fateful meeting, Apple CEO John Sculley threatens to resign unless the company’s board of directors removes Steve Jobs as executive VP and general manager of the Macintosh division.
Sculley’s threat triggers a series of events that ultimately will result in Jobs’ exit. The marathon board meeting — which continues for several hours the next day — leads to Jobs losing his operating role within the company. However, the Apple board allows him to stay on as chairman. Things won’t exactly play out like that.
Steve Jobs vs. John Sculley
As noted last week in “Today in Apple history,” John Sculley joined Apple after a remarkable run as president of PepsiCo. He had no background in high-tech products, but was considered a marketing genius. Apple’s board figured Sculley’s advertising savvy would prove invaluable for growing the nascent personal computer industry.
With Apple co-founder Steve Jobs considered too young and inexperienced to run the company, the idea was that he and Sculley would manage things together in a sort of partnership. However, a number of problems arose that kept this from playing out as planned.
One was that sales of the Macintosh 128K — launched soon after Sculley arrived at Apple — proved disappointing. Unlike previous Apple flops such as the Apple III and Lisa, this caused Apple’s first quarterly loss. The company laid off a large number of employees as a result.
In addition, Jobs remained an incredibly disruptive presence at Apple. A perfectionist who could be incredibly insightful, he hadn’t yet learned the skills that made him a brilliant CEO and manager later in his career. In addition, he continually bad-mouthed Sculley behind his back, undermining the CEO’s authority.
Forcing Sculley’s hand on Macintosh
Sculley envisioned Jobs taking on a role similar to the one he ultimately occupied years later, during his final stint at Apple: focusing on finding the next insanely great product to bring to market.
During the pivotal meeting that took place on this day in 1985, Jobs and Sculley made separate appeals to the Apple board. The board ultimately supported Sculley unanimously.
That could have settled things, but Jobs kept pushing. The following month, he confronted Sculley again. Jobs asked for another shot at proving himself by running the Mac division.
A shouting match, a showdown and an incurable rift between Jobs and Sculley
When Sculley refused, Jobs began yelling at him. The two got into a shouting match. Jobs then began planning a coup to kick Sculley out of Apple, although the board once again sided with the CEO.
After a few more failed proposals from Jobs — including the unrealistic suggestion that he could take over as CEO and president, with Sculley relegated to chairman — the Apple co-founder eventually resigned from the company on September 16, 1985. (Coincidentally, he quit on exactly the same day that he would return to become Apple CEO in 1997.)
Jobs and Sculley, who previously enjoyed a very close relationship, never spoke again.
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
2 responses to “Today in Apple history: Steve Jobs loses control of the Mac”
Yeah Sculley was a backstabbing little douche…and without Jobs, Sculley did nothing good. He should have sold sugar water for the rest of his life rather than deprive Apple of it’s core inspiration.
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