Steve Jobs stepped down from his post of CEO of Apple on Wednesday. He took the role of the chairman of the board. Steve Jobs is considered to be the directing force behind the success of the company which is today selling high-end hardware to a large number of customers. The leadership at Apple has changes; Tim Cook who was formerly the COO has now taken the position of its CEO. Unlike Jobs, Tim is from an operations background. He has been taking care of supply chains and reseller relationships. With the change in the leadership, Apple is now facing a few challenges. Apple will surely be having a product roadmap designed for several years to come. If Apple does not come up with an iteration of the iPad and iPhone every year then it’s going to be quite a shock.
An iteration of these takes almost a year to complete the designing, so we can be sure that products supervised by Jobs will stay with us for some time. But it is still uncertain that whether Jobs left the leadership with a product category already lying on the drawing board. There is real competition in the mobile market. Android’s omnipresence is going continuously. The app ecosystem that has supported iPhone since long is also being attacked. Cook will have to make sure that the app ecosystems that have kept the sales of iPhones buoyant continue to do so. Before Jobs left the leadership of Apple, he launched the iCloud Service. Cook needs to build on this foundation of iCloude service in order to make it a compelling scheme for the users of the Cloud age. For many people Steve Jobs was Apple.
He was the face of Apple and appearance at every Apple event was taken for granted. Apple and Jobs both have been very famous for the secrecy and their tight-lipped nature. For Cook it might be hard initially. He will have to learn to be quiet in order to preserve Apple’s allure. He will simultaneously also have to build a following for himself, which will be very crucial for the reputation of Apple. Swapping from one leadership to another is challenging. It will be even more challenging for Apple owing to the intricate relation between Steve and Apple’s success. It will definitely take Cook some time to assure buyers, suppliers and investors that the company is in a pair of responsible hands.