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Apple CEO was grilled at the annual shareholders meeting yesterday and some of his answers hit hard. Cook said that the company direction without Jobs is still under debate, indicating that he is carefully weighing all the options.
Replacing Steve Jobs is no easy task. The iconic Apple leader has been marked in history as having an unusual, moody, yet aggressive style of management … but it did work. Under his leadership Apple have became one of the wealthiest companies ever. Cook has an almost impossible future ahead of him. If he is successful, then part of the acclaim will still be given to Jobs, after all he left the company in such a strong position, how could Cook fail? If he isn't successful, then Cook will end up the fall guy.
Cook said they are ‘thinking about this very deeply' adding ‘This isn't a case where 100 percent of people are going to agree with what I do'.
He says the company has more money than it needs. Working out how to invest or spend the $98 billion cash reserves is a subject of much debate. Jobs liked to hoard money in the company account, but is it time for a change?
Who can remember 1997 when Apple received a $150 million handout from Microsoft to keep them alive? Many say that this was the turning point for Jobs, because he would never let a situation like that happen again. Storing away cash at every opportunity to cover potential problems down the line.
This could change shortly, because by Cook saying that they have more cash than they need, it means he might be willing to throw some of it into investments and new higher risk opportunities.
In the last 12 months, Apple stock has boomed by 50 percent, giving shareholders a wealth of around $160 billion. Apple have, at the most recent analysis earned a market wealth of $480 billion. A staggering valuation which puts Microsoft firmly in the shade.
Kitguru says: Tim Cook has one of the most difficult CEO jobs of all time. No matter what he does, he will always be compared to Steve Jobs. How can he win?
Are you kidding me? One of the most difficult CEO jobs of all time? Have you completely lost it?
He’s running a dominant market leading company and sitting on an unheard of mountain of cash – and you think that’s a tough job? There isn’t a CEO on the planet that wouldn’t jump at that. Try taking over a company burdened with debt and struggling for cash flow. Try taking over one that has no market share to speak of and no resources to expand. Try taking over a company whose main business has become obsolete and needs to transform itself to survive. (Would you rather have led Kodak 5 years ago or Apple now?) Or one embroiled in scandal and legal proceedings (Olympus)?
The argument that ‘the only way is down’ for Apple is nonsense, even if share prices dip a little or others crawl back market share, his job is still a breeze in comparison to many execs.
Actually I think the comment about it being a no win situation is kind of realistic. If Cook makes a poor call and the company lose billions it will be seen as a loss (even if Apple can afford it). If he continues the success story, it all falls on Jobs putting the company in such a good position in the first place.
I agree, its a dream job. Apple are so strong financially that it seems impossible to think it could go wrong. Cook isn’t being judged on just that. Everyone is watching for a mistake, no matter how small. He will always have Jobs on his shoulder, no matter what he does.
I think there is only one way to go – down.
Cook has a dream job, but I can see the point being made.
If he takes the company further, and they make another 50 billion over 3 years, who gets the credit? Cook? People will say ‘Jobs set him up in a no lose situation, he hasn’t done anything for himself’.
What Apple need is to release another 3 or 4 ground breaking products under his leadership when the jobs ‘development era’ is over, which will be a few more years.
If they lose any money at all, Cook gets the blame. If Cook does well, its jobs doing, not his.
The product development will be the area he can prove himself, but it will be years before people will accept his leadership. Even this generation and the next had jobs input in regards to product development, so he cant claim that either.
Its a well paid job, he is in a dream position, but in a way, if Apple were struggling just as jobs died, and he ‘brought it back up’. he would get credit. Its going to be tough for him to prove himself and step outside of jobs shadow.
Steve Jobs had the old school opinion that you should save lots of money for hard times. Tim Cook sounds like our government saying, we can’t have all these massive cash reserves just sitting around protecting us from future catastrophes. We have make it go away just like so many other struggling company’s like to do. So far he’s not impressing me with his business philosophy. I mean investing in some new technology is good and all but they still should always try to maintain the massive cash reserves. The reason so many tech company’s run into so many problems is they run things with a bean counter mentality. And they put the stock prices ahead of just trying to make excellent innovative products. Apple didn’t get where they are by using the Tim Cook we need to be more like everybody else and not have so much cash business mentality. I just don’t like the way he’s talking. By the way don’t own any Apple products, I;m a PC guy myself. But I think Steve Jobs did a fantastic job of running Apple. It really is a great company Tim Cook needs to always remember how it got that way. They are in a position where they can invest in new tech with R&D and buying up other company’s while still maintaining their large cash reserves. As it is they could loose a large lawsuit and have a couple of really bad years and still survive just fine without going into debt.. It sounds like Tim Cook doesn’t like them having that ability.