How Apple Became a $4 Trillion Company Under Tim Cook

THE NEW YORK TIMES: If the Steve Jobs era was defined by technological innovation, the Tim Cook period was one of exceptional financial growth.

When Tim Cook took over Apple in 2011, leaders from Silicon Valley to Wall Street predicted that the company’s best days were behind it. They feared that without Steve Jobs, Apple’s innovative chief executive, the company would falter.

They were wrong.

Over 15 years, Mr. Cook has engineered Apple’s rise from a Silicon Valley darling worth $350 billion into a cash-generating giant worth $4 trillion. The company’s annual revenue quadrupled, and its profits rose fourfold. The iPhone became ubiquitous, the Apple Watch proliferated, and the company developed credit cards and TV shows.

Apple’s growth is a testament to how Mr. Cook turned the iPhone into one of history’s best-selling products. Introduced by Mr. Jobs in 2007, the iPhone started the smartphone revolution, changing the way people work, socialize and travel. But Apple was selling only 72 million iPhones a year when Mr. Jobs died and Mr. Cook took over.

Two years later, Mr. Cook struck a deal with China’s largest wireless company, China Mobile. By the end of that year, Apple had more than doubled the number of iPhones it sold, and China was cementing itself as the company’s largest market after the United States. » | Tripp Mickle and Karl Russell | Tripp Mickle reported from San Francisco, and Karl Russell from New York. | Tuesday, April 21, 2026

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Ingénieur, champion de natation... Qui est John Ternus, l’homme qui va succéder à Tim Cook à la tête d’Apple ?

LE FIGARO : PORTRAIT - Cet ingénieur quinquagénaire, entré dans le groupe californien en 2001, a vu ses missions évoluer en 2025 et a été davantage mis en avant dans les conférences d’Apple.

De l’ombre à la lumière. Depuis l’automne dernier, son nom est sur toutes les lèvres dans la Silicon Valley. John Ternus, vice-président senior de l’ingénierie produit d’Apple, va succéder en septembre prochain à Tim Cook à la tête du groupe, selon un communiqué de la firme publié lundi soir.

Après quatorze ans à la tête de la firme à la pomme, celui qui avait succédé en 2011 à Steve Jobs quelques mois avant sa disparition va donc passer le flambeau à la fin de l’été 2026. Tim Cook va devenir président du conseil d’administration. » | Par Keren Lentschner | lundi 20 avril 2026

Réservé aux abonnés

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Tim Cook Will Step Down as Apple C.E.O.

THE NEW YORK TIMES: The longtime leader of the iPhone maker will be replaced by John Ternus, the company’s head of hardware engineering.

Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, said on Monday that he would step down after nearly 15 years running an operation that rode the wild popularity of the iPhone to become one of the most influential and valuable companies in the world.

Mr. Cook, 65, will move into a new role as Apple’s executive chairman in September and be succeeded in the company’s corner office by John Ternus, the 50-year-old head of Apple’s hardware engineering.

The retirement of Mr. Cook will end one of the most successful management runs in the history of American business. During his tenure, Apple’s annual profit quadrupled to more than $110 billion, while its value ballooned more than tenfold to $4 trillion.

Mr. Cook replaced the Apple co-founder Steve Jobs shortly before Mr. Jobs’s death in 2011, having earned a reputation for perfecting the nuts and bolts of a global consumer electronics business. Apple has since defined how a modern technology company operates, with products assembled in a supply chain that stretches from the giant operations that Mr. Cook helped create in China to India and Brazil and a popular retail business that operates on five continents. » | Kalley Huang and Tripp Mickle | Reporting from San Francisco | Monday, April 20, 2026

Apple Pulls Data Protection Tool after UK Government Security Row | BBC News

Feb 21, 2025 | Apple has removed its highest level data security tool from customers in the UK after the government demanded access to user data.

Advanced Data Protection (ADP) means only account holders can view items such as photos or documents they have stored online through a process known as end-to-end encryption.

But earlier this month, the UK government asked for the right to see the data, which currently not even Apple can access.

Now the tech giant has decided it will no longer be possible to activate ADP in the UK. It means eventually not all UK customer data stored on iCloud - Apple's cloud storage service - will be fully encrypted.

UK Demands Access to Apple Users' Encrypted Data

BBC: The UK government has demanded to be able to access encrypted data stored by Apple users worldwide in its cloud service.

Currently only the Apple account holder can access data stored in this way - the tech giant itself cannot view it.

The demand has been served by the Home Office under the Investigatory Powers Act (IPA), which compels firms to provide information to law enforcement agencies.

Apple declined to comment, but says on its website, external that it views privacy as a "fundamental human right".

Under the law, the demand cannot be made public.

The news was first reported by the Washington Post, external quoting sources familiar with the matter, and the BBC has spoken to similar contacts.

The Home Office said: "We do not comment on operational matters, including for example confirming or denying the existence of any such notices."

Privacy International called it an "unprecedented attack" on the private data of individuals.

"This is a fight the UK should not have picked," said the charity's legal director Caroline Wilson Palow.

"This overreach sets a hugely damaging precedent and will embolden abusive regimes the world over." » | Zoe Kleinman, Technology editor | Friday, February 7, 2025

2011: Apple Co-founder Steve Jobs Dies

HISTORY.COM — ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY: On October 5, 2011, Steve Jobs, the visionary co-founder of Apple Inc., which revolutionized the computer, music and mobile communications industries with such devices as the Macintosh, iPod, iPhone and iPad, dies at age 56 of complications from pancreatic cancer.

Born on February 24, 1955, in San Francisco, California, to unmarried graduate students Joanne Schieble and Abdulfattah Jandali, a Syrian immigrant, Jobs was adopted as a baby by Paul Jobs, a Silicon Valley machinist, and his wife Clara. After graduating from high school in Cupertino, California, in 1972, Jobs attended Reed College, a liberal arts school in Portland, Oregon, for a single semester before dropping out. He later worked briefly for pioneering video game maker Atari in California, traveled to India and studied Zen Buddhism. » | History.com Editors | Saturday, October 5, 2024

Tim Cook : l’impact de son coming out

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Apple CEO Tim Cook Granted Restraining Order against Stalker

Mario Tama/Getty Images
ADVOCATE: A Virginia woman has been accused of embarking on an escalating months-long campaign of harassment against the out Apple CEO.

A California judge has awarded Tim Cook a restraining order against a Virginia woman accused of stalking the out Apple CEO, trespassing on his property, and threatening to burn down his Palo Alto home.

In the restraining order application, filed last week in the Santa Clara County Superior Court in California, the 45-year-old woman is alleged to have demonstrated “erratic, threatening and bizarre” behavior, including emails featuring images of loaded handguns she claimed to have purchased.

Cook’s lawyers told the judge in their filing that they believe the woman from McLean, Va., is armed and in the Bay Area with intentions of returning to Cook’s home or to “locate him otherwise shortly.”

The court, which found the threat against Cook credible, prohibited the woman from possessing a firearm in addition to having any interaction with Apple employees, including its CEO. She is also banned from all Apple properties, and any violation of the restraining order can result in both jail time and a $1,000 fine. » | Rachel Shatto | Wednesday, January 26, 2022

Apple Becomes First Company to Hit $3 Trillion Market Value

THE NEW YORK TIMES: The iPhone maker’s value tripled since 2018 as its sales continued to soar and it spent hundreds of billions of dollars on its own stock.

Combine Walmart, Disney, Netflix, Nike, Exxon Mobil, Coca-Cola, Comcast, Morgan Stanley, McDonald’s, AT&T, Goldman Sachs, Boeing, IBM and Ford.

Apple is still worth more.

Apple, the computer company that started in a California garage in 1976, is now worth $3 trillion. It became the first publicly traded company to ever reach the figure on Monday, when its stock briefly eclipsed $182.86 a sharebefore closing at $182.01.

Apple’s value is even more remarkable considering how rapid its recent ascent has been. In August 2018, Apple became the first American company ever to be worth $1 trillion, an achievement that took 42 years. It surged past $2 trillion two years later. Its next trillion took just 16 months and 15 days. » | Jack Nicas | Monday, January 3, 2022

Knackt Apple auch bald die 4 Billionen Dollar?: Mit iPhones und anderen Produkten hat der amerikanische Elektronikkonzern innerhalb weniger Jahre seinen Börsenwert auf nun 3 Billionen Dollar vervielfacht. Doch erste Analysten warnen vor einem Ende des langen Laufs. »

Apple Unveils the New Apple Watch

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Half a Million Mac Computers ‘Infected with Malware’
BBC: More than half a million Apple computers have been infected with the Flashback Trojan, according to a Russian anti-virus firm.

Its report claims that about 600,000 Macs have installed the malware - potentially allowing them to be hijacked and used as a "botnet".

The firm, Dr Web, says that more than half that number are based in the US.

Apple has released a security update, but users who have not installed the patch remain exposed.

Flashback was first detected last September when anti-virus researchers flagged up software masquerading itself as a Flash Player update. Once downloaded it deactivated some of the computer's security software.

Later versions of the malware exploited weaknesses in the Java programming language to allow the code to be installed from bogus sites without the user's permission. » | Thursday, April 05, 2012

Steve Jobs: Bill Gates 'Unimaginative'

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Steve Jobs accused Bill Gates of being "unimaginative", and said LSD helped reinforce "my sense of what was important", according to his biographer.

The extracts are from Walter Isaacson's much-anticipated authorised book on Mr Jobs's life due to be released later this month. He interviewed Jobs 40 times in the past two years before the Apple chief executive died earlier this month.

In the 630-page book, he said of his Microsoft rival Gates, after he left the company to work on his charitable foundation: "BIll is basically unimaginative and has never invented anything, which is why I think he's more comfortable now in philanthropy than technology."

In another extract, Isaacson claims Jobs said that taking LSD “reinforced my sense of what was important: creating great things instead of making money, putting things back itno the stream of history and of human consciousness as much as I could.”

The book claims that Jobs died regretting that he had spent so long attempting to treat his cancer with alternative medicine before agreeing to undergo surgery.

The Apple chief executive delayed having operations and chemotherapy for nine months after the disease was discovered in October 2003. Read on and comment » | Saturday, October 22, 2011

Steve Jobs Doomed Himself by Shunning Conventional Medicine Until Too Late, Claims Harvard Expert

MAIL ONLINE: Apple CEO's choice of alternative treatment 'led to an unnecessarily early death', Dr Ramzi Amir says

Steve Jobs would probably be alive today if he had not put off conventional medical treatment in favour of alternative remedies, a leading cancer doctor has said.

Dr Ramzi Amri, a researcher at Harvard Medical School, claims the Apple boss had a mild form of cancer that is rarely fatal and that his choice of treatment 'eventually led to an unnecessarily early death'.

Writing on Quora, a forum frequented by Silicon Valley executives, Dr Amri said: 'Let me cut to the chase - Mr Jobs allegedly chose to undergo all sorts of alternative treatment options before opting for conventional medicine.

'Given the circumstances, it seems sound to assume that Mr Jobs' choice for alternative medicine has eventually led to an unnecessarily early death.' Read on and comment » | Graham Smith | Friday, October 14, 2011

Small Private Funeral for Steve Jobs at Unidsclosed [sic] Location
THE AUSTRALIAN: THE funeral for Apple co-founder Steve Jobs [1955 – 2011] is taking place today, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The funeral is characterised as a small private gathering, this person said. The person wouldn't say where or when the event was taking place, citing respect Jobs and his family's privacy.

The event comes two days after Mr Jobs died after battling an undisclosed illness. He previously underwent surgery for pancreatic cancer and had a liver transplant. » | The Wall Street Journal | Saturday, October 08, 2011

APPLE.COM: Share your thoughts, memories, and condolences »

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Steve Jobs: The Secular Prophet – Steve Jobs turned Eve's apple, the symbol of fallen humankind, into a religious icon for true believers in technology. But can salvation be downloaded? » | Andy Crouch | Saturday, October 08, 2011

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Mossberg: The Steve Jobs I Knew » | Walter S. Mossberg | Thursday, October 06, 2011

Steve Jobs Stanford Commencement Speech 2005

NZZ ONLINE: «Der Tod ist die beste Erfindung des Lebens» : Nachruf auf den Apple-Gründer » | Von Henning Steier | Donnerstag 06. Oktober 2011

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Apple Fans Pay Tribute to Steve Jobs Who Dies Aged 56
Apple fans around the world hail Steve Jobs 'a visionary' as they pay tribute to the Apple co-founder and CEO who has died at the age of 56 after a long battle with cancer.

TELEGRAPH OBITUARY: Steve Jobs: Steve Jobs, who died on October 5 aged 56, was the visionary co-founder, and later chief executive, of Apple, makers of the Macintosh computer, the iMac, the iPod, iPad, and iPhone, and the man behind the astonishing success of the computer animation firm Pixar, makers of Toy Story and Finding Nemo; in consequence he did more to determine what films we watch, how we listen to music, and how we work and play than any other person on the planet. » | Thursday, October 06, 2011

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Steve Jobs, Architect of Apple, Dies
THE BOSTON GLOBE: Steve Jobs, the demanding visionary who understood before anyone else how deeply we would live our lives through our devices, died today at the age of 56, only weeks after resigning as chief executive of computer giant Apple Inc. as he battled pancreatic cancer.

“The world has lost an amazing human being,” wrote Apple chief executive Tim Cook in a message to employees. “Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple.”

Jobs was “among the greatest of American innovators,” said President Obama in a statement posted on the White House blog. “There may be no greater tribute to Steve’s success than the fact that much of the world learned of his passing on a device he invented.”

Jobs revitalized Apple by transforming smartphones, computers, and media players into objects of desire. He insisted the company put the human experience first, focusing on design as well as technological prowess. Fifteen years ago, Apple flirted with bankruptcy; today, it is one of the most successful companies on earth.

Jobs’s rival, Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates, issued a statement saying, “The world rarely sees someone who has had the profound impact Steve has had.”

Gates closed his statement by writing, “I will miss Steve immensely.” » | Hiawatha Bray | Globe Staff | Thursday, October 06, 2011



LE FIGARO: «L'Amérique a perdu un génie» : «Un visionnaire», «un génie dont on se souviendra comme d'Edison et d'Einstein»: les hommages de grands patrons, d'hommes politiques et de milliers de fans d'Apple pleuvent après l'annonce de la disparition de Steve Jobs. » | Par Mathilde Golla, Chloé Woitier | Jeudi 06 Octobre 2011

LE FIGARO: Steve Jobs, le culte de la perfection : Le patron d'Apple, décédé mercredi à l'âge de 56 ans, a guidé son entreprise vers les sommets grâce à une gestion particulièrement stricte de ses équipes. » | Par Benjamin Ferran | Jeudi 06 Octobre 2011


FRANKFURTER ALLGEMEINE: Steve Jobs ist tot: Der Tod des Apple-Mitbegründers Steve Jobs hat Trauer und Bestürzung ausgelöst. Der Computer-Visionär starb am Mittwoch im Alter von 56 Jahren. Er hinterlässt seine Frau und vier Kinder. » | Roland Lindner | New York | Donnerstag 06. Oktober 2011

FRANKFURTER ALLGEMEINE: „Leider ist der Tag gekommen“ : Steve Jobs tritt als Apple-Chef zurück. Gebannt blicken wir auf das abwechslungsreiche Leben des Apple-Gründers und fragen: Wird man schon zum Genie geboren? » | Von Hendrik Ankenbrand | Donnerstag 06. Oktober 2011

Steve Jobs: His Life and Career
Technology editor Charles Arthur looks back at the career of the driving force behind Apple, Steve Jobs. He was the single-minded visionary who revolutionised three industries: computers, film and music.

Jobs simplified complicated things by making the customer's needs paramount, bringing cutting edge technology into globally popular consumer products

THE GUARDIAN: Steve Jobs obituary: Computing entrepreneur and inventor, and the co-founder, chairman and recognisable face of Apple » | Jack Schofield | Thursday, October 06, 2011

digits: Apple Draws Fire for New 'Gay Cure' App
A new anti-gay app approved by Apple has raised eyebrows and drawn criticism

Jobs Takes Sick Leave at Apple Again, Stirring Questions
THE NEW YORK TIMES: SAN FRANCISCO — Steven P. Jobs, the visionary co-founder and chief executive of Apple, is taking a medical leave of absence, a year and a half after his return following a liver transplant. The leave raises questions about both his long-term prognosis and the leadership of the world’s most valuable technology company.

Mr. Jobs, 55, who recovered from pancreatic cancer after surgery in 2004, has not appeared at public events since October, and has looked increasingly frail in recent weeks, according to people who have seen him.

An Apple spokeswoman, Katie Cotton, said Apple would have no further comment beyond a brief public statement in which Mr. Jobs announced he was turning daily oversight of the company’s operations over to the chief operating officer, Timothy D. Cook. >>> Miguel Helft | Monday, January 17, 2011

Steve Jobs Predicts Tablets to Replace Personal Computers
TIMES ONLINE: The era of the personal computer is coming to an end and the tablet will take its place, Steve Jobs predicted yesterday.

As Apple’s iPad racked up sales for more than two million since launch two months ago, the company’s chief executive said the transition was inevitable.

In a 90-minute performance on stage at the All Things D Conference near Los Angeles, Mr Jobs trashed Adobe over its Flash technology, spoke of his concern at the spate of suicides at the Foxconn factory in China and deflected questions about his rivalry with Google by talking about his sex life.

Mr Jobs, dressed in his trademark black polo necked top and jeans, said the iPad and other tablet-style computing devices would not completely replace laptops and desktop computers in the “post-PC era” but they would consign them to a smaller niche market.

“The transformation of the PC to new form factors like the tablet is going to make some people uneasy because the PC has taken us a long ways,” he said.

He revealed that he had started working on a tablet long before the iPhone - launched in 2007 - but switched to making a phone when he saw the possibilities of the touchscreen. Handsets are a much bigger market than personal computers. Apple has now sold more than 50 million iPhones worldwide in three years.

Worries that tablet computers were not suitable for word processing and other complex types of content creation such as photo-editing would be solved in time, Mr Jobs said, standing by his description of the iPad as a “magical” device. Tablets provided a more direct and intimate computing experience, he said. Read on and comment >>> Mike Harvey, Rancho Palos Verdes, Los Angeles | Wednesday, June 02, 2010