Although he has now stood down from his dollar-a-year chief executive’s post he remains connected to Apple and as chairman will of course continue to provide his wisdom and insight to the company.
So Apple’s share price, after a momentary drop, resumed the level that this year has made it the most valuable company on earth, surpassing, albeit briefly, even Exxon Mobil.
The out-going chief executive of Apple, Steve Jobs. Photo: AFP
Those 23 years might have been 35, but in 1985 he lost a palace coup and for 12 years was absent from the company he co-founded.
Yet even during that wilderness period, his star was pointed back to Apple. He founded another company, NeXT Computers, and there led the building of an operating system that, in 1996, Apple - by then on the edge of bankruptcy - bought and turned into Mac OS X.
It was this operating system that, along with inspired product design and Jobs’s clear vision, drive and unique understanding of the world’s digital future that made Apple the household name - globally - it is today.
It also brought fame and fortune for Jobs and his team, and that delivered products that have changed the lives and habits of millions of people around the world.
Intense personality
Jobs himself can be a difficult person: intense, charming but occasionally irascible, demanding always of the best, and extraordinarily private.
I first met him face to face in 2001 in Tokyo where he was to speak at the Japanese Macworld Expo and promote Apple in the only Asian country where, at the time, Apple had much traction.
Unusually he was wearing a suit - a grey number with pinkish pinstripes that he said he hated but claimed was the result of his wife’s advice that the Japanese were formal people and would expect something more than his signature jeans and black turtleneck shirt.
He was sitting at a desk reviewing a new type font Apple was then considering adopting, typing the names of his children.
Did he miss them, I asked. Yes, he replied, indicating he hated travel that took him away from the children for more than a day or two.
So I wrote about his feelings for his family and a week or so later heard through the Apple grapevine that I had incurred his wrath for “intruding into his private life and family.”
Forgiven
I guess I was forgiven, or at least time closed the breach, for when next I met him at the opening of one of the first Apple retail stores in New York’s SoHo (south of Houston) district, he was charming, relaxed and happy to chat.
That he has retired from day to day leadership of Apple is not as ominous for the company as it is for Jobs, his health and his future.
As he said in his letter to his colleagues and the world, he believed now that his battle with pancreatic cancer meant he “could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO.”
But he remains, much more cadaverous than he was before the cancer struck him, yet still with the intellectual fire and foresight that has characterised his spectacular career.
As chairman he will still be there to offer advice and point the way for a company far in the lead in personal computing and in shaping the digital lives that we now lead.
如果你喜欢觀看本文章，
請 「讚好」或「留言」。
0 评论:
发表评论