Do you remember all these things Apple did during Cook's era?

In August 2011, Steve Jobs, then CEO of Apple, announced his resignation and named Tim Cook as the next CEO. Now three and a half years have passed. After experiencing the initial distrust of the outside world, the rise of competitors, and then getting on the right track, Cook has slowly pushed Apple to the throne of the world's largest technology company by market value. Over the past three and a half years, what has happened to Apple seems to be calm, but in fact, everything has slowly begun to leave a new mark on Apple.

High-level changes

When you talk about Apple, you will think of Steve Jobs, Tim Cook, and even Jonathan Ive, but few people will think of Scott Forstall, Apple's former senior vice president, and even fewer people know that he is the father of iOS. After graduation, he joined NeXT, which was founded by Steve Jobs after he left Apple, in 1992, and participated in the early development of Mac OS X. Later, he joined Apple when Apple acquired NeXT. In 2005, he led the team to simplify Mac OS X and develop it into today's iOS. Later, he was also responsible for the development of the iOS SDK for developers. He was one of Jobs' most trusted people.

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After the release of iOS 6 in 2012, Apple encountered a lot of troubles. First, Apple Maps, which was developed by itself to replace the original Google Maps, often made mistakes, causing many users to encounter wrong navigation. Later, because the clock application in iOS 6 used the clock design of the Swiss Railway Company and failed to obtain official authorization in time, Apple later spent 20 million US dollars to the Swiss Railway Company as compensation. Apple's financial report for the quarter showed that Apple's revenue and profit were both lower than expected. This was also the second consecutive quarter that Apple failed to meet analysts' expectations. At the same time, Samsung made efforts in the mobile market and became the brand with the largest number of smartphone shipments in the world.

On October 29, 2012, Apple officially released an open letter announcing that Forstall would leave the company at the end of 2012 and would serve as an advisor to Apple CEO Tim Cook. His responsibilities were split into several parts and taken on by other vice presidents: the software interface design of iOS was handed over to Jonathan Ive, senior vice president of design, and the development project was handed over to Greg Federici.

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Regarding Forstall's resignation, some people believe that his departure as a non-social person will make Apple run more smoothly, while others miss the stable and easy-to-use system quality under Forstall's strict requirements when they occasionally encounter problems with iOS.

After Forstall's responsibilities were split, Federici was in charge of both iOS and OS X, and he made more consistent plans for the synchronization and interconnection between the two systems. From the updates of iOS and OS X's visual style (OS X is also flat), synchronization function (you can answer iPhone calls on your Mac) and other updates in the past two years, it can be seen that the connection between the two systems is getting closer and closer.

Ive took over the design of Apple's hardware and software, and he can consider the overall look and feel of the phone from the inside out. The flat style of iOS 7 is his declaration of indifference to skeuomorphism. To put it more deeply, the product manager of Apple in the Jobs era was Jobs, and the product manager of Apple in the Cook era is Ive. Now he is one of the most important people in Apple in the Cook era, leading the design of mobile phones, tablets, computers, watches, and systems.

Not only that, Apple also poached Burberry's CEO Angela Ahrendts and vice president of interaction design Chester Chipperfield to prepare for the launch of the next new product.

Existing product reform

From the day the iPhone was born to the iPhone 4 that made history, and then to the iPhone 5s that triggered a buying frenzy, regardless of whether other brands were 5 inches or 7 inches, the screen size of Apple's first seven generations of mobile phones never exceeded 4 inches. In various promotional videos, they also promoted that small-screen phones can be operated with one hand and are more convenient to use. However, the market demand for large-screen phones has always been strong, and the Android camp has snatched away many potential iPhone customers with various large-screen phones.

It was not until 2014 that the 4.7-inch iPhone 6 and 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus finally joined the ranks of large-screen mobile phones. The public's desire for large-screen iPhones was so strong that when the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus were launched, the market reaction was as unstoppable as a volcano that had been forcibly sealed for a long time and finally broke through the resistance and erupted. With the help of the shopping season, 74.5 million units were sold in the first quarter of the launch, breaking the historical record of mobile phone sales in a single quarter.

During the Jobs era, Apple always insisted on keeping the iPad size at 9.7 inches. However, during the Cook era, Apple decided to launch a 7.9-inch iPad mini, which also attracted market attention.

New products: Apple Pay, Apple Watch

At the iPhone 6 launch event in September 2014, Apple also released two new products: Apple Pay and Apple Watch.

Apple Pay is not a specific product, but a service. It is ignored by many people, but it may be the most suitable product for Apple at the moment. To do mobile payment well, two capabilities are essential: brand appeal and user experience - the former is used to attract partners such as banks and merchants, and the latter is used to attract users.

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Three months after the release of Apple Pay, Apple announced that the credit cards currently supported by Apple Pay accounted for 90% of credit card transactions in the U.S. As Apple Pay gradually becomes popular, Apple can also make a lot of money from the credit card payment link.

According to Forrester Research, driven by Apple Pay, mobile payments in the United States will reach $142 billion by 2019. Its analyst Denée Carrington predicts that Apple Pay will account for $34 billion of total e-commerce transactions in the United States by then.

Apple Watch is not just a new product for Apple in the Cook era, but a new product that belongs entirely to the Cook era. Even though the iPhone will continue to be an important source of revenue for Apple in the next few years, Apple needs to open up its own territory. The Apple Watch project was launched in the fall of 2011, just as Jobs was leaving and about to die. It can be said to be a new product that belongs entirely to the Cook era. Cook has proven that he can lead Apple to follow Jobs' original path, but he needs to prove that he can also lead Apple to find its own next path.

So when introducing Apple Watch, Cook used Jobs' famous quote "One more thing..." to start the presentation. In the two press conferences introducing Apple Watch, Cook rarely gave a long explanation in person. Everything proves the importance of Apple Watch to Apple in the Cook era. We cannot say whether Apple Watch can bring Apple the next glory, but as John Gruber said: "I don't know if Apple Watch is something Apple should do, but I know what Apple should not do the most: do nothing."

Strategy: Acquire Beats and enter into strategic cooperation with IBM

On May 29, 2014, Apple announced that it would acquire Beats for $3 billion, acquiring the latter's headphone production line and streaming music subscription service. On July 16, 2014, Apple announced that it had reached an exclusive cooperation agreement with IBM. Apple officials said: "The cooperation will integrate the market leadership of the two companies, create new business applications, and introduce IBM's big data and analysis capabilities to iPhone and iPad, thereby transforming the enterprise mobile market."

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There are different interpretations of Apple's acquisition of Beats. Some say that iPhones will come with Beats headphones in the future, some say that Apple wants to integrate Beats' streaming music subscription service, and some say that Apple's move is to recruit Beats founder Jimmy Iovine. This person is not only an entrepreneur, but also a record and film producer. Some people believe that Apple hopes to use his reputation in the entertainment industry to provide a more solid guarantee for Apple's future cooperation with entertainment content providers.

The cooperation between Apple and IBM is more straightforward: the two companies jointly develop enterprise-level mobile office software for iPhone and iPad, and IBM is responsible for selling these Apple iOS devices to enterprises. Although the two companies had fierce competition 30 years ago, their common interests have brought them together again.

Apple in the Cook era has redistributed senior management responsibilities, reformed existing products, released new product lines, entered the next big profit project, and sought cooperation to expand its own field. Take the existing path well and find the next path. Many people once held the view that Apple is about to decline because Cook does not have Jobs's persistence in products. Judging from the current situation, this statement is only half right. Things like the protruding camera of the iPhone 6 would not have happened in the Jobs era, but in contrast, Apple in the Cook era has become more concerned about market demand and has responded faster. Apple has given up some of Jobs's previous insistence on products, but it is the most profitable technology company.