Brief
Apple Inc. is a designer, manufacturer, and marketer of personal computers, software, networking solutions, and peripherals with worldwide annual sales of $19.3 billion (2006). The company’s product family includes the Macintosh line of desktop and notebook computers, the iPod digital music player, the Mac OS X operating system, the iTunes Music Store, the Xserve G5 server, and others. Apple's products are sold through its own chain of stores (approximately 170 retail stores in the USA, Canada, Japan, Italy and the UK), through third-party wholesalers, and online. The company employs over 20 000 permanent and temporary workers all over the world. Apple is now headed by its co-founder Steve Jobs as CEO.
Founded in a garage by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak on April Fool's Day in 1976, Apple has always been the industry's most fabled story. One can say that the personal-computer industry itself began when that the Cupertino, California-based company introduced in 1977 its Apple II, a fully-assembled computer with open architecture, sound and color graphics. In December 1980, Apple went public with offering of 4.6 million shares sold out within minutes. In 1983, Apple introduced Lisa, the forerunner of Macintosh. It was aimed at the corporate market, but was soon dropped in favor of the Mac. In 1998, Apple presented the iMac, a low-priced Internet-ready Macintosh that was the first personal computer without a floppy disk. Apple sold 800 000 iMacs in a year, making it the fastest-selling computer in its history. In 2001, the company launched the iPod that has proven to be phenomenally successful consumer electronics product. In 2007, Apple announced the iPhone, a convergence of an Internet-enabled smartphone and video iPod.
The company was known as Apple Computer, Inc. for its first 30 years, but removed "Computer" from its name on January 9, 2007 along with the announcement of iPhone and Apple TV digital video system – products, which represent the company's ongoing expansion into the consumer electronics market in addition to its traditional focus on personal computers.
Culture
From the very beginning, Apple’s culture has always been remarkable for two distinguish features: innovations and passion. It has employed the integrator approach - the model with both the highest costs and highest risks. But it was the inevitable choice for Apple's innovation-venerating culture, which demanded something akin to absolute artistic control. In 1995 Steve Jobs compared innovation to "fashioning collective works of art" and said it afforded "the opportunity to amplify your values" over the rest of society.
Apple was also one of the most successful companies founded in the 1970s that broke the traditions of what a corporate culture should be in terms of organizational hierarchy, thanks to the influence of its founders. Jobs often walked around the office barefoot even after Apple was a Fortune 500 company. By early 1980s, this trait had become a key way the company differentiated itself from its rivals.
Because of a series of chief executives, each with his own idea of what Apple should be, something from its original nature has been lost, but Apple still has a reputation for fostering individuality and excellence that reliably attracted talented people. To recognize the best of its employees, Apple created the Apple Fellows program. Apple Fellows are those who have made extraordinary technical or leadership contributions to personal computing while at the company.
Leadership
The co-founder Steve Jobs is responsible for creating Apple twice. In 1985, he was forced out of the company he had founded and came back only in 1997. Between these two milestones the company endured a number of failures, as one chief executive officer changed another. John Scully, who had finally removed Jobs in his time, was fired in 1993. His successor, Michael Spindler, broke tradition by licensing Apple technology to outside firms, paving the way for ill-fated Apple clones. By 1995, Apple had $1 billion worth of unfilled orders.
Gil Amelio, praised for the recovery of National Semiconductor, was named CEO in February 1996, beginning another era of leadership. Amelio cut Apple's payroll, but provoked strict criticism for his compensation package and inability to relate to the company's unique corporate culture. Apple's financial losses reached $1 billion in 1997. Its market share, 16% in the late 1980s, stood at less than 4%. Fortune magazine named Apple "Silicon Valley's paragon of dysfunctional management."
Amelio left in July 1997, but before his departure he hired Steve Jobs as his special advisor. Steve first became interim CEO and worked for several years with an annual salary of $1. Apple's recovery occurred during the ensuing months.
Jobs assumed his responsibilities with the same passion that had made Apple one of the greatest success stories in business history. He immediately discontinued the licensing agreement that spawned Apple clones. He eliminated 15 of the company's 19 products, withdrawing Apple's involvement in making printers, scanners, portable digital assistants, and other peripherals. His insistence on high-quality, stylish-looking products struck a chord with many people who appreciated the beauty of Apple products, resulting in such magnificent successes as the iMac and the iPod.
While Steve Jobs was a charismatic evangelist for Apple, some of his early colleagues described him as an erratic and tempestuous manager. But since his second coming to Apple his management style has radically changed. In fact, he seems to relish other people's ideas and wisely surrounds himself with top-notch executives in all the key corporate positions. He has transformed the corporate culture into one in which employees wanted to come to work and have a mission to change the world for the better.
Background Links
The Second Coming of Steve Jobs, Alan Deutschman, 2001
iCon: Steve Jobs, The Greatest Second Act In The History Of Business, Jeffrey S. Young, William L. Simon, 2005
If He's So Smart...Steve Jobs, Apple, and the Limits of Innovation, Fast Company
