neutrino23

Can Apple Remain the Unique Innovator It Was, Without Steve Jobs?

It is really hard to quantify the effect Steve has on Apple. My take is that he brings discipline (being able to say no to distractions) and he keeps the company focused on the product, not on the bottom line. A couple of years ago Apple replaced their best selling iPod mini with the iPod nano. If there had been a timid CEO in place or if accountants and lawyers ran the place that never would have happened. They would have run that cash cow into the ground before starting on a new product. Before that Steve, on the strength of his personality, pulled the customer base over from PowerPCs to Intel CPUs. Apple has great financial and business people, but they don't manage Apple by watching the stock price. That would be death for Apple.

My take is that Apple is about excellent personal and industrial design. Fitting the product to the use. That makes it hard for pundits to evaluate Apple products. Time and again some will look at an Apple product and count the gigabytes and megabytes and clock cycles and pixels and give the product low marks. Yet the customers love them.

One other point is the interconnectedness of Apple products. It adds value to an accessory to have it connect to the computers to and to the online stores. Yes, the iPhone is tied to your Mac, but those are golden handcuffs. The iPhone and iPod are better, more useful products because they can connect to your Mac.

So when someday Steve does retire from Apple the danger for Apple is not a lack of creativity or engineering or design talent but having the discipline and courage to stick to their path.