Analyst: Apple can carry on fine if Jobs should step down
Posted by Dennis Sellers 
Oct 6, 2008 at 3:37pm
Apple’s stock drop on the false report that CEO Steve Jobs had suffered a major heart attack was unwarranted since the company can carry on just fine even without its legendary leader and co-founder, Ezra Gottheil, an analyst at Technology Business Research, says.
“Apple doesn’t need Jobs anymore,” Gottheil told Computerworld. “He’s established three sound businesses—Mac, iPod and the iPhone—and the company knows how to execute his fanatical devotion to design and usability. There’s a stable management team in place, and they know what they’re doing.”
The analyst thinks that, if Jobs stepped down, Tim Cook, currently chief operating officer, would run the company. Cook ran Apple while Jobs out in 2004 after his cancer surgery. Jonathan Ive, Apple’s senior vice president for industrial design, would pick up the reins on product design. The July hiring of former Segway Inc. Chief Technology Officer Doug Field as Apple’s new vice president of design, Gottheil told Computerworld is an attempt by Apple to free up Ive to take on a more strategic view of product design.
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Dennis Sellers
Dennis has been a newspaper editor/reporter (seven years) and teacher (seven years). He has over 4,000 magazine, newspaper and online articles to his credit. He has also covered the Mac and tech industries for over a decade for such online publications as MacCentral, MacMinute and now MacsimumNews.
Nixtr Says:
While that may be true, expect a 20% haircut (minimum) if Fearless Leader were to put himself out to pasture. You would not want to go into that fateful day in margin or options, since you would be getting hammered.
Posted on October 06, 2008