Apple CEO Tim Cook is stepping down from the job he inherited from the late Steve Jobs, ending a nearly 15-year reign that saw the company’s market value soar by more than $3.6 trillion during an iPhone-fueled era of prosperity.
Cook, 65, will turn the chief executive duties to Apple’s head of hardware engineering, John Ternus, on Sept. 1 while remaining involved with the Cupertino, California, company as executive chair. That’s similar to the transitions made by Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Netflix’s Reed Hastings after they ended their highly successful tenures as CEOs.
“It has been the greatest privilege of my life to be the CEO of Apple and to have been trusted to lead such an extraordinary company,” Cook said in a statement. “I love Apple with all of my being, and I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to work with a team of such ingenious, innovative, creative, and deeply caring people.”
Ternus, 50, has been with Apple for the past quarter-century, including the past five years overseeing the engineering underlying the iPhone, iPad and Mac — a role that made him a prime candidate to succeed Cook.
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“I am profoundly grateful for this opportunity to carry Apple’s mission forward,” Ternus said in a statement.
The transition to a new CEO comes at a pivotal time for Apple. Artificial intelligence has unleashed the most upheaval within the industry since Jobs unveiled the first iPhone in 2007. Apple has had a rough start in AI after stumbling in its efforts to deliver new features built on the technology, as promised nearly two years ago.
Earlier this year, Apple finally turned to Google — an early leader in the AI race — to help make the iPhone’s virtual assistant, Siri, into a more conversational and versatile helper.
Although he never shook the perception that he lacked Jobs’ vision, Cook leveraged the popularity of the iPhone and other breakthroughs orchestrated by his predecessor to lift Apple to heights that seemed unfathomable when it was on the brink of bankruptcy during the mid-1990s.
