Apple: The Story of two Steves
Well, it’s hard to talk about computers without referring to these 4 companies: Microsoft, Apple, Intel and last but not the least – The Big Blue “IBM”. I’m not sure how well I would be able to cover the great contributions these companies have made to the computing world with such small space and time that I have. But, again, just giving a try to write about “Apple” today.
A college drop out and a techie guy working for HP, joined hands (and brains) and together, they shook the world… IBM included. The story of the two Steves – Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak (a.k.a. Woz) has all the ingredients to make a Bollywood hit. A phenomenal rise to fame by becoming one of the fastest entrant to Fortune 500 league, then a catastrophic downfall with losing market share and then, again, a steady growth is the story in brief about Apple.
In the late 70’s, a company MITS came up with a device called “Altair” which can be fairly called as the first “Personal Computer”. Till then, Mainframes and Mini computers were ruling the market, only to be used by big corporations and Labs. The Altair attracted a lot of hobbyists who wanted to make their own computers.
Jobs and Woz were also one of these enthusiasts. Earlier, they tried to make money by selling a device called “Blue Box.” At $150, Blue Box can be connected to the telephone and you could make calls to almost anywhere in the world absolutely free of cost. The telecom companies, obviously, didn’t quite appreciate this and the Steves had to stop this after getting beaten up by some thugs.
After “Altair” came into market, Jobs and Woz studied it and managed to build their own personal computer in Jobs’ garage. Woz was still working with HP. Jobs made him leave that job and together, they founded Apple. Woz pitched in $1500 by selling his car to build the initial capital. They started manufacturing and selling these computers. The story goes that for months, they were looking for a good name for their company. Finally, Jobs threatened that if his people don’t come up with any other good name by 5 PM that day, he would name the company as “Apple”. And, eventually, nobody could suggest any other name and Jobs continued with “Apple”.
Over a period of time, Apple became immensely popular, first in the hobbyists and then in the general market. The popularity reached so high that IBM had to take up a project immediately to build their own PC named “Project Chase”. IBM being a behemoth, things moved very slowly within the organization. The delay in actions used to infuriate the then IBM chairman Frank Carrey. In every meeting of Project Chase, he used to bark, “WHERE IS MY APPLE?”
Apple was growing. Both Jobs and Voz were inexperienced to handle this growth. So they brought in Mike Markkula who had taken an early retirement (well, much too early – at the age of 33) from Intel. Markkula had become a becoming millionaire by selling his Intel stocks. Mike introduced better management in Apple and was instrumental in making it more organized.
Apple always strived for perfection and user friendliness. As described in earlier Gyans, it was Jobs who used the GUI, Mouse, Icons concepts developed by PARC, effectively in making PC more user friendly and hence, popular. In late 70’s, Apple II hit the market and became a major success. It was followed by even more advanced “Lisa” but Lisa was too ahead of its time and hence failed to grab the market. In 1983, Jobs invited John Sculley to become CEO of Apple. Sculley was then President of PepsiCo. During his persuasion, Jobs had asked Sculley, “Would you like to continue selling Sugarated Water or do you want to change the world?” Finally, Sculley gave in and joined Apple. Jobs and Sculley shared such a good rapport that Sculley once boasted, “Apple has one leader: Steve and I…” But things soon started falling apart. Macintosh – Job’s baby - couldn’t pick up well in the market. IBM retaliated hard in the PC market and Apple started losing their market.
Additionally, there were internal fights between Apple II team and Macintosh team headed by Jobs because of his constant interference in product development. Meanwhile, Woz had, also, left the company. Finally, Sculley had to forcefully remove Jobs from the company he founded. This was a major setback for both Apple and Jobs. Under the leadership of Sculley – who was a marketing wizard, the company struggled to get back on track. Soon, IBM compatibles also started to eat up Apple’s market.
After being thrown out of the company, Jobs started two companies “NeXt” and “Pixar” (Pixar is one of the best Animation movie makers. It has produced movies like Toy Story, Bug’s Life etc.)
In the late 80’s, Apple also got involved in dispute over GUI with Microsoft. It was, finally, won by Microsoft. So Apple was losing in Software market as well. The apple was, thus, losing its juice.
Eventually, and as fate would have it, even John Sculley was fired from his post of CEO. Apple bought NeXt and reinstated Jobs as CEO. Since then, Apple has come up with great products like iMac, iPod that has clearly shown their passion for perfection, excellent “Look and Feel” and user friendliness as visioned by Steve Jobs.
Recently, Jobs was diagnosed with a very rare type of Cancer but it was cured in time.
There is a beautiful book written by John Sculley named “Odyssey – From Pepsi to Apple” It depicts various stages that Apple and Sculley’s friendship with Jobs went through. Even, books about Microsoft have a lot of references of their interactions with the Apple people.
Apple showed the world how agile a small company can be and how innovation and perfection can produce products that ushers the world into the future era. It was a dream place to work for all the maverick youth who wanted to change the world. And who other better leader could they find but Steve Jobs!?
A college drop out and a techie guy working for HP, joined hands (and brains) and together, they shook the world… IBM included. The story of the two Steves – Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak (a.k.a. Woz) has all the ingredients to make a Bollywood hit. A phenomenal rise to fame by becoming one of the fastest entrant to Fortune 500 league, then a catastrophic downfall with losing market share and then, again, a steady growth is the story in brief about Apple.
In the late 70’s, a company MITS came up with a device called “Altair” which can be fairly called as the first “Personal Computer”. Till then, Mainframes and Mini computers were ruling the market, only to be used by big corporations and Labs. The Altair attracted a lot of hobbyists who wanted to make their own computers.
Jobs and Woz were also one of these enthusiasts. Earlier, they tried to make money by selling a device called “Blue Box.” At $150, Blue Box can be connected to the telephone and you could make calls to almost anywhere in the world absolutely free of cost. The telecom companies, obviously, didn’t quite appreciate this and the Steves had to stop this after getting beaten up by some thugs.
After “Altair” came into market, Jobs and Woz studied it and managed to build their own personal computer in Jobs’ garage. Woz was still working with HP. Jobs made him leave that job and together, they founded Apple. Woz pitched in $1500 by selling his car to build the initial capital. They started manufacturing and selling these computers. The story goes that for months, they were looking for a good name for their company. Finally, Jobs threatened that if his people don’t come up with any other good name by 5 PM that day, he would name the company as “Apple”. And, eventually, nobody could suggest any other name and Jobs continued with “Apple”.
Over a period of time, Apple became immensely popular, first in the hobbyists and then in the general market. The popularity reached so high that IBM had to take up a project immediately to build their own PC named “Project Chase”. IBM being a behemoth, things moved very slowly within the organization. The delay in actions used to infuriate the then IBM chairman Frank Carrey. In every meeting of Project Chase, he used to bark, “WHERE IS MY APPLE?”
Apple was growing. Both Jobs and Voz were inexperienced to handle this growth. So they brought in Mike Markkula who had taken an early retirement (well, much too early – at the age of 33) from Intel. Markkula had become a becoming millionaire by selling his Intel stocks. Mike introduced better management in Apple and was instrumental in making it more organized.
Apple always strived for perfection and user friendliness. As described in earlier Gyans, it was Jobs who used the GUI, Mouse, Icons concepts developed by PARC, effectively in making PC more user friendly and hence, popular. In late 70’s, Apple II hit the market and became a major success. It was followed by even more advanced “Lisa” but Lisa was too ahead of its time and hence failed to grab the market. In 1983, Jobs invited John Sculley to become CEO of Apple. Sculley was then President of PepsiCo. During his persuasion, Jobs had asked Sculley, “Would you like to continue selling Sugarated Water or do you want to change the world?” Finally, Sculley gave in and joined Apple. Jobs and Sculley shared such a good rapport that Sculley once boasted, “Apple has one leader: Steve and I…” But things soon started falling apart. Macintosh – Job’s baby - couldn’t pick up well in the market. IBM retaliated hard in the PC market and Apple started losing their market.
Additionally, there were internal fights between Apple II team and Macintosh team headed by Jobs because of his constant interference in product development. Meanwhile, Woz had, also, left the company. Finally, Sculley had to forcefully remove Jobs from the company he founded. This was a major setback for both Apple and Jobs. Under the leadership of Sculley – who was a marketing wizard, the company struggled to get back on track. Soon, IBM compatibles also started to eat up Apple’s market.
After being thrown out of the company, Jobs started two companies “NeXt” and “Pixar” (Pixar is one of the best Animation movie makers. It has produced movies like Toy Story, Bug’s Life etc.)
In the late 80’s, Apple also got involved in dispute over GUI with Microsoft. It was, finally, won by Microsoft. So Apple was losing in Software market as well. The apple was, thus, losing its juice.
Eventually, and as fate would have it, even John Sculley was fired from his post of CEO. Apple bought NeXt and reinstated Jobs as CEO. Since then, Apple has come up with great products like iMac, iPod that has clearly shown their passion for perfection, excellent “Look and Feel” and user friendliness as visioned by Steve Jobs.
Recently, Jobs was diagnosed with a very rare type of Cancer but it was cured in time.
There is a beautiful book written by John Sculley named “Odyssey – From Pepsi to Apple” It depicts various stages that Apple and Sculley’s friendship with Jobs went through. Even, books about Microsoft have a lot of references of their interactions with the Apple people.
Apple showed the world how agile a small company can be and how innovation and perfection can produce products that ushers the world into the future era. It was a dream place to work for all the maverick youth who wanted to change the world. And who other better leader could they find but Steve Jobs!?
posted by Gyan for the Day! | 7:19 pm
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