During the night of last Monday, April 20, the American businessman and engineer Tim Cook, general director of Appleannounced that he would leave the post after almost 15 years of running a company that has taken advantage of the enormous popularity of iPhone to become one of the most influential and valuable from all over the world.
The 65-year-old theoretical computer scientist will move into a new role as CEO of Apple starting next Tuesday September 1and will be succeeded by the 50-year-old American engineer, John Ternus, who works as vice president senior hardware engineer at Apple Inc. since January 2021.
Given this situation, Cook’s retirement will put an end to one of the most successful management careers. successful of American business history, since during his period at the helm of Apple, annual profits quadrupled to exceed US$110 billion, while its value multiplied by more than ten to reach US$4 trillion.
This is because Cook replaced Apple co-founder, Steve Jobsshortly before his death in 2011, so Apple has since defined how a modern technology company works, with products assembled in a supply chain that extends from the operations it helped create in China, India and Brazil.
John Ternus: The future of Apple
According to what was stated by the American newspaper The New York TimesTim Cook described John Ternus as an executive “visionary“, with “the mind of an engineer, the soul of a innovative and the heart to lead with integrity and honor“, given that the current director of hardware engineering has been two decades in the company.
“He is, without a doubt, the person indicated to drive Apple towards the future“added Tim Cook, who mentioned that John Ternus emerged as the favorite candidate for the position at the end of the 2025after another veteran executive, the chief operating officer Jeff Williamswill leave the company after playing a role fundamental in the products.
According to the British television network BBCDuring his quarter century at Apple, Ternus has worked on essentially every product important that the company has launched, including each of the generations of iPadmany generations of iPhonethe launch of hearing aids AirPods and the latest Apple Watch.
In turn, John Ternus assumed responsibilities that go beyond traditional hardware engineering, because they supposedly influenced on direction, product features, and strategic decisions typically reserved for business executives. higher rankso Cook realized he could replace him.
Apple’s new challenges
According to the American television network cnnlarge companies like Amazon and Meta are laying off staff en masse amid pressure to adopt AI-based workflows, so, as is typical with a new director, Ternus could use his position to reduce the Apple template.
John Ternus’ main challenge will be to allocate those savings to growth investments or actions that benefit shareholderswith the aim of quickly gaining the favor of wall street, the largest stock exchange in the world, so Apple could go from having 160 thousand employees globally to have only 80 thousand workers.