Apple provided first quarter figures exceeding everyone’s wildest expectations, preceded by the announcement that CEO Steve Jobs would be going on a new sick leave. The timing of his leave seems relatively well chosen: in the wake of the recent figures, COO Tim Cook should be able to take care of the shop without too many problems.
First the figures. Perhaps the most remarkable fact is that with its iPad, Apple has within one year built up a business with quarterly revenues at USD 4.6 billion, and 7.331 million devices sold. The iPad has since its introduction in January 2010 -again, within one year- seen sales soar to USD 9.6 billion. Such results bring back statements made about Google in Q3 2010. Mobile had become a billion dollar business, people announced proudly, because revenues had passed the USD 1 billion annual run rate. When exactly Google entered the mobile market is difficult to pin down, but in any case, it happened years ago (Android was bought in 2005).
It's safe to say that Apple has managed to successfully differentiate revenues. Mac desktops and laptops accounted in the past quarter for only 20 percent of revenue, while the word Computer after the name Apple was removed a few years ago. The important new product categories that have come on board include the iPhone (39% of sales), the iPad (17%), iPod (13%), iTunes (5.4%), other hardware (2.2%) and software (2.9%). So okay, even though Apple has seen its share of necessary failures and although Apple TV is still not flying, the way to diversification has been much harder for Google, as the company tries to move away from only search and search related advertising.
The only questions which remain are: is the company in good hands with Tim Cook? And: what does the future hold for Apple without Steve Jobs? The type of leader seen in Steve Jobs, blending charisma and creativity, is rare, so there would likely be a negative effect if he did not come back. Such a lead would be difficult to find. Consider Jeffrey Immelt at GE or Steve Ballmer at Microsoft - they were not able to equal their predecessors (Jack Welch and Bill Gates). Still, we can assume that the spirit of Steve Jobs has been sufficiently embedded in the Apple culture. And that would very well be chief operations officer Tim Cook. But even aside from Cook, there are many other executive that could succeed, such as Jonathan Ive or Phil Schiller, the man responsible for developing the iPhone, iPod, and iPad.
In any case, one can say with certainty that the ‘job’ Steve Jobs performed is complete: Apple is no longer a one product company and is sufficiently diversified to keep up with the flow of innovations that will come out of Silicon Valley in the coming years.
