Industrial Design  

Apple will soon be reporting its first profit drop in many years. According to Peter Cohan this outcome brings into clearer focus the biggest challenge facing Apple’s board: Is Tim Cook the person for the CEO job and if not, who would be better?  Cohan points his finger directly at Jonathan Ive.

In a interesting article Forbes contributor Peter Cohan, an author, former management consultant and former venture capitalist, has suggested that Apple's Tim Cook should step down to make way for Jonathan Ive.

"Now it's time," Cohan writes, "for Apple's board to put the person with design skill in the CEO job."

Ive's impact on Apple has been considerable since Steve Jobs returned to helm the company in 1997.  At that time, Jobs refocused the company to once again become a design-first leader in the industry.

With the iMac and the iPod to the iPad and iPhone, Jobs and Ive in tandem brought the company to soaring heights and the design to new levels of simplicity and ubiquity.


London-born Ive is currently Apple's senior vice president of Industrial Design, reporting to CEO Tim Cook. Since the Apple Maps fiasco, Sir Ive is also responsible for the leadership and direction for Human Interface (HI) software teams across the company.

But should Ive further extend his role at Apple?

In Walter Isaacson's biography, it is documented that that Jobs had set things up so that Ive would have uncontested design power when Jobs left Apple; essentially, no one, not even Cook, would have the power to challenge Ive's designs.

Cook hasn't yet done what Jobs was so brilliant at, created a whole new product for Apple, but there is speculation that the company is set to revolutionize the television market and that may save Cook from critics like Cohan.

What do you think?

SOURCE  Forbes

By kree8tiv

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