Tim Cook is not Steve Jobs. Then again, he never claimed or tried to be. Yet, the man who has led Apple for the last 15 years has often been in the shadow of his predecessor. Cook, as has now been confirmed, will be stepping down from the CEO role in September. Joh Ternus – a long-time Apple engineer and “product guy” – will be taking over. While it’s been fashionable to criticize Cook, you can be sure that a lot of Apple stockholders will be hoping for continuity. Cook will actually not leave the company entirely, becoming Executive Chairman, which in itself tells you a bit about his standing with Apple’s board.
Nonetheless, it will be interesting to see how tech history recalls Cook’s tenure. Apple has been incredibly successful in the decade and a half of its time at the top of the company. It became a multi-trillion-dollar company on his watch. And despite some criticisms of the lack of wow factor in the innovations we saw under Jobs, Cook was very, very adept at persuading us to do what he wanted. Namely, buy iPhones, iPads, Macs, AirPods, and Apple Watches. In addition, he oversaw Apple’s incredible revenues from app fees and services, sometimes controversially so.
Apple is in a different place
It is certainly worth remembering that the state of the tech industry is very different today from when Cook took the reins from Jobs. Back then, our minds were blown that we could access email, watch YouTube and play blackjack on a Safari mobile browser on the nascent iPhones and iPads. Now, that is old hat. And, as mentioned, it has become a stick to beat Cook with, because all he did was make better iPhones and iPads.
But of course, Cook did oversee new innovations. Some have worked remarkably well, Apple Watch, for instance, whereas others have been more of a flop, such as the Vision Pro, though we should perhaps reserve judgment on that for now. But it is worth remembering that Jobs had missteps too, from the iPod Hi-Fi to iTunes Ping.
Yet, while Cook’s tenure has been characterized by almost unprecedented financial success – Apple recently recorded record profits (again) – we would argue that it will only be judged in hindsight, and for a very specific reason: artificial intelligence.
Apple was caught off-guard with AI
The consensus has been for a long time that Apple was caught on the hop with AI. Once OpenAI launched ChatGPT, Google was able to respond quickly because it had dedicated and well-funded AI projects, such as DeepMind, bubbling away for years. It just had to take them out of the oven. Microsoft, too, was able to jump on its partnership with OpenAI. Meta, while perhaps not a direct rival to Apple, made up for lost time by throwing money at the “problem,” with Mark Zuckerberg abandoning his dream of the “metaverse” to boot.
Initially, Apple looked panicked as the AI boom happened around it. We were told Apple Intelligence – very like Apple to brand the technology – was on the way, and that we would soon have an AI-powered Siri on every phone and Mac. Media reports talked of Project Greymatter and ACDC, codenames for the AI projects that Apple was working on. To an extent, Apple has delivered some AI features, but nothing to really call home about. And finally, in January of this year, Apple confirmed that it would be asking Google for help, paying its rival to use Gemini to power the AI Siri.
The ultimate embarrassment and admission that Apple “lost” the AI race? Perhaps. However, as we said, this is a moment, like Cook’s tenure, that will be judged in hindsight. The logic might say, yes, Apple needs proprietary AI, but Cook has watched his rivals spend hundreds of billions, and commit to spending trillions, on data centers and AI R&D. There are some theories that they have been overextended, and predictions of an AI bubble about to burst. Apple, while spending some of its mountains of cash, is not that overexposed.
Cook may look prescient on AI with hindsight
And that’s the rub: there is every chance that Cook ends up looking like a genius for not getting caught up in the AI euphoria. We explained earlier that Apple was caught off guard with AI – and there was initial panic – but there is a calmness about it now, a sense that Apple can – and will – slot AI products into its ecosystem when needed. Years from now, when the AI winners and losers are crowned in the same way that Apple, Amazon, et al. emerged from the ashes of the Dot.com boom and bust, Tim Cook’s legacy might just be that he held Apple back.
