It’s good to be the CEO — Apple chief executive Tim Cook was paid $98.7 million in 2021. That’s a combination of a base salary, an incentive plan and other compensation, but the lion’s share is in Apple stock.
Other top Apple executives also have 8-figure annual compensation packages, if not anywhere close to Cook’s.
In some people’s misguided memories, Jobs did no wrong. Ever. And members of this reality-challenged group — let’s call it the Church of Steve Jobs — frequently post comments on social media like, “Apple would be so much better if Steve Jobs were still in charge.”
But in reality, Jobs made plenty of mistakes. Here are some of his worst foul-ups.
Development of an Apple car just hit another speed bump. Doug Field, who’d reportedly been managing the project, just left to join the Ford Motor Company.
This is surely a blow to Apple’s secretive automotive efforts. And the company was already multiple years away from having anything to put in a showroom, according to the latest leaks.
Apple CEO Tim Cook is one of the best paid U.S. executives according to a new report. He pulled in a whopping $265 million in 2020 from his salary, bonus, and stock awards.
But that’s chump change compared to what Elon Musk made.
Since he came out as gay eight years ago, Apple CEO Tim Cook has led the company through the most successful period in its history. Cook once said he wanted to prove you can “be gay and still go on and do some big jobs in life.” He’s certainly done that.
But maybe there’s more to this story than overcoming prejudice. In 2018, Cook told CNN that being gay is “God’s greatest gift to me.” Far from a disadvantage, could being gay actually be an instrumental part of his success?
As a gay man myself, Cook has always been an inspiration for me. So to celebrate Pride Month, here’s why I think being gay made him a better CEO.
A job opening at Apple for an “Alternative Payments” business manager set off a wave of speculation that the iPhone-maker is getting into cryptocurrency.
It’s apparently a change of heart by CEO Tim Cook, who’s on the record as being opposed to privately controlled currencies.
The reports of Beats’ death are (reportedly) greatly exaggerated. Rather than phasing out the brand, as had been rumored, Apple put Scott Croyle, the former head of product design at phone-maker HTC, in charge of crafting new Beats headphones, according to an unconfirmed report.
April 29, 1997: Steve Jobs’ friend Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle, calls off his bid to take over Apple.
Ellison’s plan is to reinstall Jobs, who is then just an adviser to Apple CEO Gil Amelio, as the company’s chief executive. He also wants to take Apple private again.
Dan Riccio, one of Apple’s top designers, is moving to a mysterious new role in Cupertino.
After joining Apple in 1998, Riccio worked on loads of groundbreaking products, from the first iMac to last year’s AirPods Max and the M1-powered Macs. Now, he’s become Apple’s “vice president of engineering.”
Going forward, Riccio says he will be “focusing all my time and energy at Apple on creating something new and wonderful that I couldn’t be more excited about,” according to a press release Monday.
Apple’s self-driving car division is reportedly on the move, but not in the usual way. The project has been transferred into Apple’s artificial intelligence division.
The reorg comes at the retirement of Bob Mansfield, who’d been managing the company’s not-so-secret autonomous vehicle development.
Tim Cook quoted poet Maya Angelou in a tweet commemorating Steve Jobs on Monday, the ninth anniversary of the Apple co-founder’s death.
“A great soul never dies,” Cook’s message reads. “It brings us together again and again.” Cook also added a personal note: “You’re always with us Steve, your memory connects and inspires us every day.”
Meanwhile, on the Apple website, admirers’ remembrances of Jobs flowed across a tribute page.
For long-time Apple fans like myself, Tuesday marked the end of an era. Phil Schiller stepped down from his role as VP of worldwide marketing.
Schiller was the last of the OG — a stalwart onstage companion to Steve Jobs, long before it was fashionable to watch Apple keynotes. Schiller was there at all the seminal moments in Apple history, including the launch of iMac, iPod, iPhone and iPad. Back in the day, he and Jobs were a remarkable double act. Jobs would announce the products, and then Schiller would stride in to perform the demos.
Fortunately, Schiller’s not gone for good. In his new role as an Apple Fellow, he will still keep an eye on the App Store and Apple Events. But I wanted to take this opportunity to remember the man, the legend, that is Phil Schiller. Here are the top 10 reasons why I’ll miss him.
The Apple board of directors just lost a powerful member: Disney CEO Bob Iger. His resignation, revealed by an Apple filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission, comes as Disney and Apple prepare to launch competing streaming services.
Meanwhile, the new Disney offering garnered a rave early review that called it “more addictive than heroin.”
Jony Ive began to drift away from Apple shortly after the Apple Watch launched, a new report claims. The Apple design chief’s waning enthusiasm caused problems during development of the iPhone X and other products.
Following news that Ive is finished at Apple (at least as a full-time employee), this account backs up earlier reports stating that he had had one foot out the door for a while. In some cases, Ive’s long goodbye made things difficult for his co-workers.
What will Apple miss most as design chief Jony Ive spacewalks out of the spaceship campus? We think it’s the “fiddle factor” he injected into all his best Apple design.
Find out all about this tactile innovation in this week’s free issue of Cult of Mac Magazine for iOS. We’ve got the lowdown on Ive’s exit — and the elusive “>Evans Hankey, the woman who will lead Apple’s famous Industrial Design studio going forward.
If you prefer to read in a browser, you can find links to the week’s best Apple news, reviews and how-tos below.
Apple CEO Tim Cook sent a memo to all Apple employees Thursday informing them that long-time Chief Design Officer Jony Ive is leaving the company.
Instead of talking about the giant hole Ive will leave behind, Cook spun the Apple design guru’s exit as an “important evolution” for the company. He also talked about how great it will be for everyone as Ive pursues his passions as head of his new design firm, LoveFrom.
Apple’s long-time design boss Jony Ive revealed today that he is leaving the company.
After helping create some of the most iconic consumer products of all time for Apple, Ive says he is going to strike out on his own to create a new creative business called LoveFrom.
Tim Cook is seriously underrated. Seven years after taking over as CEO from Steve Jobs, the narrative that he’s riding his predecessor’s coattails needs to change. It’s just not true.
Cook is his own man, transforming Apple in his own way. See Monday’s Apple credit card and subscription News+ app as examples, which are centered on customer privacy, a big Tim Cook mandate.
The company today is a better corporate citizen than it was in the past. And as a business, it’s firing on all cylinders. Cook is doing almost everything right. Some pundits are beginning to argue he’s Apple’s best CEO yet.
Today marks the 52nd birthday of Jony Ive, Apple’s much-admired chief design officer. As the shaper of products including, well, virtually everything that Apple builds, Ive has been a central presence since Steve Jobs’ return to Cupertino in the late 1990s.
To celebrate his birthday, check out one of Ive’s most interesting interviews. Happy birthday, Jony!
February 19, 1981: Jef Raskin, creator of the Macintosh project, sends a memo to Apple CEO Mike Scott, listing his many complaints about working with Steve Jobs.
He claims that Jobs, who joined the Mac team the previous month, is tardy, shows bad judgment, interrupts people, doesn’t listen and is a bad manager.
When Apple fires an executive, the company is rarely straightforward about the situation. Apple never puts out a press release stating plainly that the executive was canned. So Tuesday’s unexpected announcement that Angela Ahrendts, Apple’s head of retail, is leaving in April led many to suspect she was fired.
That’s because the announcement came as a surprise and seems rushed. She’s certainly not retiring or quitting to join another company. The press release phrase “new personal and professional pursuits” sounds like code for “canned.”
While O’Brien may not be a household name to most Apple fans, she’s been with the company for more than three decades. From the days of Steve Jobs saving Apple from bankruptcy to watching Tim Cook leading the company to a first-ever $1 trillion valuation, O’Brien has seen huge changes during her tenure with the iPhone-maker. Now she’s set to be one of the most powerful people in Silicon Valley.
Here are six things you didn’t know about the new Apple retail boss.
Amidst a seemingly never-ending barrage of criticism, Siri is once again looking for a new team leader. After reports of infighting and disagreements about how to advance Siri last year, the internal development team is without direct leadership … again. This time, though, the move was self-inflicted and strategic.
Apple co-founder Steve Jobs was known to be incredibly demanding. But one retired Apple executive said when it came to standing in line in the company cafeteria, Jobs waited his turn like everyone else.
This would not be a surprising revelation about most people, but Jobs’ mercurial nature is the stuff of legend. The late Apple exec’s moods and commands have been the source material for books and movies. His character is even sung about on the opera stage.