Not His Long Tenure, But This That's Suspected to Be Making Apple Anxious and Replacing Tim Cook

The reason behind the replacement of Apple’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Tim Cook is not an issue of his long tenure. There is another matter suspected to have made Cook replaced with the new Apple CEO John Ternus. Last week, Tim Cook announced his resignation from the CEO position at the company headquartered in Cupertino, United States (US). Cook’s leadership baton will be continued by Apple’s Head of Hardware John Ternus in September. The company released a photo of the two executives walking side by side in almost uniform attire, dark shirts, blue jeans, and Apple Watches. Interestingly, although the transition process appears to run peacefully, there is another matter that has made Apple anxious and is suspected to be the cause of their need for a new leader immediately. Tim Cook has led Apple for nearly 15 years, since 2011. However, that long tenure is not the sole reason Cook is being replaced with Ternus. Apple is actually trying to break the chain of “incrementalism” (a culture of playing it safe and slow changes) that Tim Cook has recently adopted, in order to survive in the era of artificial intelligence (AI) onslaught. Tim Cook’s success over the last 15 years is undeniable. He brought high-level operational discipline and generated annual revenues of more than $400 billion US dollars. He also produced hit products, such as the Apple Watch and AirPods (although the foundation of the technical team is still a legacy from the Steve Jobs era). However, Cook’s leadership style that overly emphasises deliberation and caution is now becoming a boomerang. Cook is known as someone reluctant to make quick decisions. “If you come to Tim with option A or B, he won’t choose. Instead, he will ask a series of questions if he feels doubtful,” revealed an internal Apple source. This indecisiveness has claimed victims. Cook’s grand vision through the Vision Pro headset ended up flopping in the market despite spending billions of dollars and a decade of research. The same goes for Apple’s autonomous car project Apple Car worth $10 billion US dollars which was ultimately cancelled. Interestingly, John Ternus is a figure who from the start opposed and was cautious towards both projects. “Ternus will choose,” the source continued. “His choice may be right or wrong, but at least it’s a decision.” Ternus’s bold style has recently become evident when he initiated the MacBook Neo. He urged Apple to break the tradition of expensive premium products by releasing a colourful laptop priced at $599 US dollars (around Rp 10 million) to target the younger generation.