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PUBLISHED ON
AUGUST 6, 2015

Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy


BY BRUCE KOGUT * AND JERRY KIM†

Introduction1
Tim Cook became CEO of Apple on August 24, 2011, following the death of Steve Jobs, the
company’s founder and one of the most charismatic and entrepreneurial leaders of his
generation. Jobs was idiosyncratic and brilliant. His career was a roller-coaster in its early
years. It was marked by phenomenal successes, especially through Pixar, the animated film
company Jobs also created, and through the phoenix-like revival of Apple that he led,
triumphantly, on his return in 1997. The many biographies, and even films, about Jobs’s life
emphasize his obsessive commitment to the finest details of design and to the consumer
experience—qualities that distinguished Apple’s products from the competition. A difficult
and demanding leader, Jobs looked for people with similar values. By his vision and the force
of his personality, he inspired product teams to innovate and to deliver consumer products of
a distinctive aesthetic.
While Jobs was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay area and dropped out of Walter Reed
College without ever finishing college, Cook’s biography was quite different. Born in 1960 in
Mobile, Alabama, he earned a BS degree in industrial engineering from Auburn University
and then an MBA from Duke University in 1988. Having worked over a decade at IBM, where
he learned the lessons of integrated marketing product design and manufacturing, Cook
joined Compaq, at that time the largest personal computer company in the world. He left
Compaq after only six months and then hopped over “by intuition” to the still struggling
Apple Computer Inc. “to work for a creative genius, and to be on the executive team that could
resurrect a great American company.” 2 Cook became Apple’s senior vice president of
worldwide operations and then, in 2007, its COO.
During the years before Cook became CEO and Jobs was leading arguably the most
remarkable turnaround in recent corporate history, Apple’s stock price rose from about $1 per
share in 1998 to $55 per share shortly after Jobs died in October 2011. 3 (See Exhibit 1: Apple’s

Author affiliation Copyright information


* Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Professor of Leadership and Ethics, © 2015 by The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New
Columbia Business School York.

Assistant Professor of Management, Columbia Business School
This case cannot be used or reproduced without explicit permission
Acknowledgements from Columbia CaseWorks. To obtain permission, please visit
Sungyong Chang, PhD ’16, provided research support for this www.gsb.columbia.edu/caseworks, or e-mail
case. ColumbiaCaseWorks@gsb.columbia.edu.

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Operating Results 1980-2014.) That same month, California governor Jerry Brown declared
October 16 to be Steve Jobs Day, and an invitation-only memorial was held at Stanford
University. Bono, Yo-Yo Ma, and Joan Baez performed on that occasion, and Oracle CEO Larry
Ellison and Jonathan Ive, the famed industrial designer at Apple, spoke. 4 It must have crossed
the minds of many employees, investors, and competitors that it had been Jobs who had driven
the success of the Apple revival, and they must have wondered whether Cook could possibly
maintain the obsessive visionary focus of the founder of the company, which many cited as
the source of Apple’s competitive advantage.
THE APPLE COMPUTER AND IBM’S ENTRY
Apple began in 1976 as the brainchild of visionary Jobs and engineer Steve Wozniak, who is
credited with the brilliant inventions of the early chip designs. Consumers bought an
integrated product; that is, they purchased software and hardware for one package price. The
proprietary software was lodged principally in the operating system (OS), which provided the
platform for secondary software applications such as word processing and spreadsheet
calculations. The core of the hardware was the microprocessor and dedicated chips (e.g., video
cards), whose design determined both the speed with which the computer could carry out
operations and the functionalities it could deliver. Apple created products that were easier to
use than its competitors’ and grew rapidly, launching its record-breaking IPO in 1980.
The company’s first serious competition came in 1981, when the industrial computing giant
IBM decided to manufacture personal computers (PCs). In contrast to Apple’s approach and
its own mainframe strategy, IBM’s “skunk works” team created a product that relied on an
open hardware architecture. They designed very little of the actual product, outsourcing
almost every aspect of the manufacturing process, even the final assembly. 5 For its PC, IBM
licensed the text-based Disk Operating System (DOS) from the fledgling Microsoft and bought
microprocessors from Intel. Backed by one of the best-respected corporate brands and eight
decades’ experience of selling information technology to American companies, IBM succeeded
through working directly with leading consumer and business retailers. 6
Apple had several technical advantages over its competitors that allowed it to respond to
IBM’s PC. In 1983, influenced by innovations first made at Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center
that it then further developed, Apple came out with the Lisa. Though replaced by the
MacIntosh, or Mac, in 1984, the Lisa pioneered a superior graphical user interface (GUI) that
took its competitors years to emulate and made Microsoft DOS look boring and tedious. Xerox
also was the source for the Lisa mouse and for the “plug and play” system that connected a
proprietary Apple peripheral device (e.g., a printer) to an Apple computer. Xerox in turn
received $100,000 in share options in Apple at a pre-IPO price of $10. Developed by a product
team led by Jobs in competition with the Lisa team, the Mac was a revolutionary product that
provided the dominant design for PCs for the next decades.
Nonetheless, the Mac was frequently beset with compatibility problems, leading to customer
frustration. Faced with layoffs and an unhappy board, Jobs resigned as CEO of Apple in 1985.
The IBM PC’s popularity continued to grow, and its sales rose quickly. By 1985 Apple’s
category leadership had been eclipsed. Apple president John Sculley, whom Jobs had hired in

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BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
1983 and who replaced Jobs as CEO in 1985, acknowledged IBM’s lead: “We’re going to adjust
to IBM’s world. They’re not going to adjust to ours because they don’t have to.” 7
WINTEL, CLONES, AND UNIVERSAL COMPATIBILITY
By 1985 Microsoft had introduced Windows, its response to the GUI that Xerox and Apple had
pioneered. With Intel producing the microprocessor and Microsoft producing the operating
system, these developments soon gave rise to the so-called Wintel machine. The compatibility
of Wintel computers began to draw the focus of secondary software developers away from
Apple. One commentator observed: “The concentration of the PC-software market was
perhaps its most noticeable feature. It was characterized as a winner-takes-all market. While
Microsoft was the biggest winner, the second-tier companies were also very successful at
defending their markets.” 8 The late 1980s saw the rise of the clones—computers with a
Microsoft operating system and components that matched IBM’s. 9 A clones could be anything
from a branded model manufactured by well-known upstarts such as Compaq and Dell to
“the PC assembled from an international cornucopia of standard parts and resold, typically
through mail orders or storefront.” 10 Subsequently, “because of the openness and modularity
of the IBM PC and the dominance of its bus and software standards, a huge
industry…emerged to manufacture compatible parts. The resulting competition … [drove]
down prices in almost all areas.” 11
Consumers liked the ubiquitous Wintel platform that enabled them to share information
because their files used the same application programs running on the same operating system.
These beneficial externalities increased consumers’ willingness to buy Wintel-based
computers, and developers whose products complemented the new standard were eager to
come up with new software applications. Wintel created an ecosystem that encouraged new
entries and cooperation on standards, even among competitors.
Bucking the open system platform strategy, Apple constantly lost market share and
profitability in the 1990s. (See Exhibit 2: Relative Market Share for Personal Computer
Operating Systems.) While Apple’s average price per unit remained fairly constant during this
period, the inflation-adjusted price for an average PC declined, just as it had for many years.
(See Exhibit 3: Relative Price of Computers to GDP.) Apple believed that a broad range of
consumers would perceive the benefits of hardware-software integration, user-friendly
design, and ease-of-use and would accordingly pay a premium for them. The company
ultimately dominated the niche educational and publishing markets but found that it was
unable to compete in the lucrative corporate market, where powerful IT buyers minimized
their expenditures by negotiating the lowest possible unit price.
In 1995—a year in which Apple suffered a net loss of nearly $2 billion—Jobs, from his position
as a shareholder, reflected on the path the company had taken in the early 1990s:
(Apple management) got very greedy and instead of following the original
trajectory of the original vision—which was to make this thing an appliance,
to get this out there to as many people as possible—they went for profits and
they made outlandish profits for about four years…What that cost them was
the future. What they should have been doing was making reasonable profits

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BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
and going for market share, which was what we always tried to do... Now it’s
got a single-digit market share and falling. 12
After a booming period in the 1990s, the clones too faced the law of commoditization. While
unit prices declined, development costs rose. Roughly speaking, the cost of developing a new
operating system grew from about $500 million in the early 1990s to a rumored $1 billion for
Microsoft’s XP, which came out in 2001, to even more for Microsoft’s Vista a few years later.
The PC market was a tough, unwelcoming environment for all but Intel, Windows, and plug-
in product specialists; together, they captured most of the economic value in the PC ecosystem.
(See Exhibit 4: Value Capture in the PC Industry.) IBM’s exit was the bellwether of the change
in PC industry. By 2004, when the Chinese computer company Lenovo acquired the last PC
business operated by IBM, its laptop division, IBM’s early dominance was a dim memory for
most users.

Steve Jobs and the iProduct


After leaving Apple in 1985, Jobs had not gone gently into the good night. In particular, he had
managed the development of NeXT, an operating system that competed directly against the
Macintosh OS. He had also acquired the computer graphics division of LucasFilm, Pixar,
which would become the industry leader in computer animation. It was perhaps no surprise,
then, that in 1997 Apple’s board decided to bring Jobs back, in a last-ditch effort to save the
company.
Upon his return, Jobs made a number of rapid moves to turn Apple around; these included
terminating unprofitable projects, launching the “Think Different” advertising campaign,
accelerating the development of the NeXT operating system (now part of Apple), and, most
notably, introducing the iMac personal computer. Created by Ive, the iMac was lauded by
consumer analysts for its sleek graphics and affordable price, panned by technology critics,
and widely embraced by millions of users looking for an idiosyncratic alternative to the
generic Wintel machine. 13 The iMac capitalized on what Jobs believed was the company’s
greatest competitive advantage; because Apple “buil[t] the whole widget,” the Mac user
experience was “dramatically superior to that on Windows.” 14
IPOD AND THE LAUNCH OF THE DIGITAL HUB STRATEGY
The iMac staunched the bleeding at Apple, but its real success was in launching the company’s
iProduct “digital hub strategy,” which Jobs unveiled at MacWorld 2000 to “position the Mac
as the manager of the exploding library of digital content resulting from the migration of
cameras, music players, and other consumer electronic devices from the analogue to the digital
world.”15 The iPod, a new portable music player, was to be the centerpiece of this plan.
In 2001 Apple launched the iPod and the related iTunes jukebox software that allowed users
to manage their song collections. Jobs had matured during his years away from the company.
He now had a network of contacts in the consumer electronics, music, and video industries.
He had also come to understand the complex issues related to movie and music rights as well

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BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
as the business models of industries that were driven by consumer trends and that required a
structured release of products to the consumer through a variety of channels.
The iPod employed an updated file compression format, AAC, which could encode songs with
Apple’s FairPlay digital rights management system to prevent unauthorized duplication. 16
The initial iPod was priced at $400, well above other portable audio players. However,
reviewers felt that the premium would seem justified to early adopters, both because of the
impressive style and functionality of the device and because of the status that owning it
conferred. 17
The portable music player industry could only work by acquiring music content, which was
owned by the five major music studio companies located in Hollywood, the United Kingdom,
and continental Europe. They discovered and marketed artists that they signed to contracts
with their studios, and they controlled the distribution channels, including records, CDs, radio
broadcasts, and concerts.
The emergence of the Internet and of notorious Internet companies like Napster as distribution
channels appeared to Hollywood to be a massive and illegal disruption to that model because
those companies distributed music without paying royalty fees to the studios. Individuals
could “rip” music from the CDs they purchased and, using such audio coding formats as MP3,
post it on Internet-accessible servers. The response of the five “majors” was to sue these new
music distributors, who relied on peer-to-peer or similar collaborative sharing. These efforts
met with some success, and Napster was shut down in 2001. These suits were also brought
against individual users, including a 12-year-old girl in 2003 “who thought downloading
songs was fun.” 18 Other than pursuing the legal strategy, the majors made little progress in
responding to the Internet as a new distribution channel.
Jobs approached music publishers in late 2001 to convince them to distribute their songs
through the iTunes Store, which users could access through the Internet on their personal
computers. 19 The negotiations took 18 months. Executives were impressed with the simplicity
of the system and saw that consumers found it easier to use than a subscription service. 20
Jobs’s pitch was his pledge not to license the proprietary FairPlay technology to other media
players, alleviating music publishers’ concerns that an open technology could easily be
compromised. 21 The system locked users in; songs downloaded through the iTunes Store
would not play on any system other than the iPod/iTunes combination. So encoded, music
could not be shared easily, and the majors would be able to control its distribution on the
Internet. These advantages gave Jobs the leverage necessary to secure a major concession from
the music publishers: songs could be purchased individually (rather than only as part of an
album) for 99 cents each. 22 Perceiving few alternatives to Apple and not wanting to be shut out
of a new and potentially significant distribution channel, all the major music publishers signed
the distribution agreement in April 2003. Although FairPlay was eventually “cracked,” Apple
was able to defend its system in updated versions. 23
In naming iTunes the Invention of the Year in 2003, Time magazine discussed the significance
of Jobs’s negotiations with the record companies:

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BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
iTunes software, which had previously been nothing more than a place to store
and play digital music on a Mac, would become a gateway to the Music Store,
where you could easily find and save music to your hard drive, CD, or iPod
music player—no subscription necessary, just 99¢ per song, or $9.99 for an
album. Competitors … said Jobs had been given a sweet deal by the labels
because Apple, with its miniscule share of the computer market, was never
going to be a real distribution threat. ‘The Mac world is a walled garden,’ said
BuyMusic.com vice president Liz Brooks. ‘The PC environment is like the Wild
West.’ 24
According to Jobs, the “dirty little secret” was that Apple only made 10 cents on each song
download. When asked why Apple even bothered with the song sales, Jobs replied, “Because
we’re selling iPods.” 25
In 2003 Apple also introduced a version of iTunes that could be run on Windows. Sales growth,
which was already robust, went through the roof, and Apple began its ascendance in the
worldwide market for portable music players. With the introduction of the more affordable
iPod mini and iPod shuffle in 2004 and 2005, respectively, market share continued to climb;
iPod grabbed over half of the market by 2006. (See Exhibit 5: iPod Market Share 2001–2006.)
By September 2012 Apple had shipped over 350 million iPods, up from fewer than one million
in 2003. 26 That same month, Apple announced that 20 billion songs had been downloaded
through the iTunes Store. 27
iPod sales clearly drove corporate growth during this period. (See Exhibit 6: Apple Sales by
Product 1998–2007.) The iPod also became the first Apple-branded product most Windows
users ever bought. In 2008 it was estimated that they represented over 90% of iPod owners.
Industry analysts speculated that “the elegance and simplicity of the iPod has motivated a
growing percentage of these owners to consider a Mac in their next computer purchase.”28

Enter the iPhone


THE WIRELESS INDUSTRY: SERVICES AND SYSTEMS
The iPod was the first major new product success for Apple in the firm’s bid to become a
consumer electronics and digital lifestyle company. Now Apple turned its attention to other
growth opportunities. In 2007 the market for a sophisticated multimedia phone looked
promising. (See Exhibit 7: U. S. Smartphone Shipments 2005–2007.) Consumer purchases were
keeping pace with accelerating technological developments, which were moving mobile
phones closer in functionality to leading personal digital assistants like the BlackBerry and the
Palm Pilot. Yet the telecom companies, which faced massive capital investments, struggled to
make profits in a very competitive market. In addition to having to bear the transmission and
infrastructure costs, the telecoms competed for spectrum (air frequencies) that could support
the increasing amount of data (e.g., e-mails) that could be transmitted. In many countries,
spectrum was bought through competitive auctions that have amounted to hundreds of
billions of dollars in the past decade.

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BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Monetizing these capital investments proved to be challenging. While the total number of cell
phone subscribers had exploded since the earliest days of the industry, increasingly
competitive pricing strategies had slowed down revenue growth for major US providers prior
to Apple’s iPhone entry. (See Exhibit 8: Revenue of Wireless providers 2001–2006.) Somehow,
the hopes that the new spectrum would enable demand for more data transmission had not
been met in actual revenues. Telecom companies converged on common strategies: to attract
customers through incentives such as free phones, to retain customers by threatening stiff
penalties for the cancellation of service contracts, and to generate additional revenue through
data plans and subscriptions to news and entertainment services. In some years, ringtone
download revenues were more important than income from data transmission. In 2004 the
global revenue for ringtones exceeded $3 billion; in the United States, it was more than $315
million. 29
IPHONE
Jobs unveiled the iPhone on January 9, 2007, to great fanfare. At the time, Nokia and Motorola
were enjoying record sales of cell phones, and the smartphone market was dominated by
BlackBerry OS and Windows Mobile devices. Smartphones were designed around carrier
limits and focused on corporate applications. In contrast, Apple designed the iPhone to appeal
to consumers and satisfy their communication needs. Following the blockbuster success of the
iPod, the iPhone became one of the most anticipated consumer product releases, eliciting a
cult-like following.
In addition to developing the iPhone’s revolutionary design and integrating the iPhone into
the digital hub ecosystem created through the iPod and Mac product lines, Apple broke new
ground with its pricing and distribution strategy. Unlike leading cell phone manufacturers
such as Motorola, Sony, LG, Samsung, and Nokia, Apple partnered with only one carrier to
sell and contract plans for its US customers. Having been rebuffed by Verizon—the number
one provider in the United States—Apple struck a deal with AT&T. Moreover, unlike
manufacturers who required their carrier to agree to subsidize the retail price of a handset in
order to attract customers, Apple did not seek any such subsidies from AT&T. Instead, Apple
made a revenue-sharing arrangement with AT&T that would extend over the two-year life of
a cellular service plan. 30 (See Exhibit 9: Comparison of iPhone and Blackberry Bold Economics
at AT&T.)
In June 2007 Apple launched its iPhone, quickly capturing 4% of the global market despite a
premium price tag of $499–$599. However, after rising to 6.5% by year-end 2007, the iPhone’s
market share went south. In response, in July 2008 Apple redesigned both its pricing strategy
and the device, introducing a new model with 3G technology (i.e., faster data transfer) at a
significantly reduced cost of $199–$299.
At the same time, the company also launched the iPhone AppStore, enabling iPhone (and
high-end iPod) users to select from thousands of applications, ranging from games to medical
directories, many of which were free downloads. Apple vetted every app for reliability and
functionality and took 30% of all revenue generated from apps sold through the store. The
new 3G model grabbed 12.9% of the market in a matter of weeks. 31

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BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Apple refined the basic design of subsequent generations of the iPhone (making it thinner and
lighter), while enhancing the performance of the hardware (i.e., with faster processors, 4G
technology, higher resolution cameras, and other features). By 2011 the iPhone was available
from all major carriers, and Apple surpassed Nokia as the largest handset mobile
manufacturer in terms of revenue. More strikingly, Apple dominated all other manufacturers
in terms of profits captured; according to some estimates, Apple took 73 cents of every dollar
earned in the handset manufacturing industry in Q1 2012. 32 Court filings revealed that Apple
enjoyed gross margins from 49% to 58% of US iPhone sales. 33
Despite the continued success of the iPhone, the rise of Google’s Android OS presented a
significant challenge. In 2005 Google signaled its intention to enter the mobile space, acquiring
Android, Inc., a start-up that was developing a smartphone OS based on Linux. Five months
after the first iPhone launched, the Open Handset Alliance (comprised at that time of Google,
HTC, Sony, Samsung, Sprint, T-Mobile, Qualcomm, and Texas Instruments) unveiled the
Android platform. The first smartphone-running Android—the HTC Dream—was released in
October 2008. Google did not charge manufacturers a licensing fee for use of the Android
platform, saving them considerable development costs on the OS side as well as providing a
strong incentive for them to differentiate their products so that they would stand out above
the crowd. A prime example of such innovation was Samsung’s Galaxy S line. Building on
consumer demand for large screens, Galaxy smartphones captured a significant share of the
Android market and offered a viable alternative to the premium (but small-screened) iPhone.
By 2012, Samsung was the only other phone manufacturer to make a profit in the industry;
from 2011 to 2014, Samsung surpassed Apple to claim the top position in global smartphone
market share.
While Samsung attacked Apple on the high end of the market, Android posed a considerable
threat on the low end, particularly in developing markets. The onslaught of cheap Android
phones released in China and India allowed Google to gain a significant foothold in the fastest-
growing markets for smartphones. (See Exhibit 10: Global Market Share by Mobile OS and
Exhibit 11: Most Popular OS by Country, October 2014.) Many analysts had predicted that
Apple would release a low-cost iPhone in response to these inexpensive competitors.
However, the company staunchly maintained a premium pricing strategy with its iPhone 5s
and 5c releases, leading to much criticism from technology pundits. 34 Many wondered if
history was repeating itself, with the rise of cheap Android phones eroding the dominance of
the iPhone just as the development of inexpensive clones had led to the downfall of the
Macintosh in the 1990s.
However, responding to consumer demand for large screens, in October 2013 Apple released
the iPhone 6 and the iPhone 6 Plus, putting the company squarely back in the top position of
the global smartphone market. The move neutralized the key advantage of high-end Android
phones and convinced many Android users to switch over to the iPhone ecosystem. Even in
developing countries such as China, the iPhone 6’s larger screen size and premium image
allowed Apple to beat strong local competitors such as Xiaomi and Huawei and claim the top
spot in sales.

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BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
All told, through March 2015 Apple sold over 700 million iPhones. The iPhone revenue of over
$40 billion was responsible for over 69% of the company’s total revenue in Q2 2015.
Meanwhile, Apple had paid app developers over $30 billion since the iPhone’s launch, and the
App Store had surpassed 100 billion downloads.
IPAD
The follow-up product to the iPhone was the iPad, launched in April 2010. Apple had arguably
invented the tablet with the Newton in 1993, but that product had been ahead of its time and
had failed to gain traction in the market. After years of speculation, the iPad was announced
and immediately captivated Apple fans and technology enthusiasts with its elegant design
and functionality. Within a month, Apple had sold a million iPads—half the time it had taken
Apple to sell the same number of first-generation iPhones. Apple captured 75% of the tablet
PC market by the end of 2010, and iPad sales quickly surpassed Mac sales.
By sharing the iOS platform with the iPhone, the iPad had immediate access to a large number
of applications and to developers familiar with its development environment. Many believed
that the iPad had ushered in a post-PC era of computing, posing a significant threat to the
Wintel alliance that had dominated the industry for over 20 years. The iPad was also a great
business for Apple: while not at the level of the iPhone, the iPad still enjoyed remarkably high
(23%–32%) gross margins.
However, by 2015 the iPad seemed to be losing momentum. Despite robust growth in the
tablet category, Apple had seen five consecutive quarters of sales decline, and its market share
had dwindled to 28%. 35 Longer upgrade cycles, competition from cheaper Android tablets,
and cannibalization from the larger iPhone 6 Plus all seemed to hurt iPad sales. With consumer
sales lagging, in 2014 Apple had announced a partnership with IBM to make inroads into the
corporate market. 36
THE NEXT NEXT BIG THING
With profits soaring to record levels quarter after quarter, Apple sought to continue its
dominance for the foreseeable future. The search for the next great product category, however,
was not a smooth process. Most notably, Apple had difficulty in successfully launching
services, especially with Apple Maps and iCloud. Despite enjoying significant advantages due
to Apple’s control over iOS, both Maps and iCloud failed to displace incumbent rival services
Google Maps and Dropbox. Speculations about an Apple-manufactured TV display and/or a
streaming TV service to replace cable TV persisted for many years, but the reluctance of
content owners to join Apple’s platform continued to delay announcements of such products.
With the lessons learned from those uncharacteristic struggles with product launches, Apple
hoped to find the “next next big thing” to continue the momentum of the iPhone. Three
products in particular seemed to be central to Apple’s strategy moving forward.
APPLE PAY
Apple Pay is a mobile payment system that lets users of Apple mobile devices make
contactless payments at point of sales terminals and complete other online transactions.
Leveraging near field communication (NFC) technologies, the application digitizes and stores

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credit card information and securely communicates it to the merchant after users are validated
via Touch ID fingerprint authentication. With major credit card companies (Visa, MasterCard,
and American), banks, and merchants (including Whole Foods, Walgreens, and McDonalds)
on board, the October 2014 launch of Apple Pay garnered positive press and was hailed as a
step toward solving the notoriously difficult problems surrounding mobile payments.
Of course, Apple Pay was far from the first mobile payment system to appear in the market.
PayPal and Google had launched mobile wallets and payment systems with similar NFC
technology three to four years before Apple, and there had been wide adoption of mobile
payment systems in many Asian countries. However, there was limited public awareness of
these technologies, and they had clunky user interfaces; the door was therefore open for
Apple—with its immense brand power and skill in design—to set the standard for the mobile
payment industry. Apple also emphasized the security of its system as a key differentiator
from prior mobile payment services, with Apple Pay’s combination of multiple security
technologies (e.g., encryption and tokenization) providing considerable protection against
data breaches. The (projected) lower fraud rates convinced banks and credit card issuers to
share part (0.15% of every transaction) of the interchange fee charged to merchants (typically
2%–3% per transaction) with Apple. Existing mobile payment solutions failed to secure similar
agreements. Apple also drew a sharp contrast between its strategy and Google’s, promising
customers that it would not track usage patterns or share information with merchants.
More than one million credit cards were registered with Apple Pay in the first three days that
the service was available, and Cook predicted that “2015 will be the year of Apple Pay.”
Despite his confidence, in mid-2015 the long-term success of the payment platform was still in
doubt. Merchants hesitated to install the payment terminals, which could cost between $300
to $500 each and were also fairly expensive to maintain. In addition, merchants had their own
competing platform, CurrentC, which allowed them to cut out credit card companies and
avoid interchange fees. Spearheaded by Walmart and boasting members such as Target, Best
Buy, RiteAid, and CVS, CurrentC lacked much of the elegance of Apple Pay, but nonetheless
provided a formidable competitor. Finally, on the mobile side, Google (rebranding as Android
Pay) and Samsung (Samsung Pay) quickly offered technologically equivalent or superior
payment systems. For example, in early 2015 Samsung acquired LoopPay, a company that
developed technology that allowed merchants to use legacy credit card readers instead of the
costly NFC terminals for mobile payment. Competition for wallet share looked to be intense.
APPLE MUSIC
Apple’s announcement of a new music service in June 2015 marked the company’s return to
the domain that had revitalized it and set it on its path toward the iPhone and mobile
computing. Streaming services such as Pandora, Spotify, and Rdio had completely upended
the traditional music purchasing experience, posing a serious threat to Apple’s iTunes music
download business. Apple’s $3 billion acquisition of the headphone manufacturer Beats in
2014 was widely viewed to have been made for the Beats Radio music service rather than for
its hardware and was considered to be a precursor of Apple’s foray into the streaming side of
the music business.

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Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Apple Music combined elements of a curated Internet radio station, a streaming music service
(similar to Spotify), and a social network platform (called Connect), where artists could
interact with fans. While it was similar to other services in library size and cost ($9.99/month),
it also differed from them in various ways. First, Apple emphasized having human curators,
including celebrity DJs like Zane Lowe. Second, unlike Spotify, Apple did not offer a free ad-
supported tier, although it did offer a three-month free trial period for all users. (Apple initially
refused to compensate artists during this trial period, but reversed course after singer Taylor
Swift issued an open letter criticizing the company.)
Apple Music launched to mostly positive reviews, but some critics noted that the service was
“confusing, buggy, and extremely frustrating to use” 37 Noted Apple blogger Jim Dalrymple
called Apple Music a “nightmare” after losing 4,700 songs from his iTunes library when he
migrated to the new service. 38 More broadly, it was unclear whether Apple Music was
differentiated enough from Spotify and Pandora to convince those services’ users to switch
over. While Apple Music functioned as a defensive move to stem the decline of iTunes music
downloads by keeping legacy users within the Apple ecosystem, many had hoped that the
service could revitalize and revolutionize the music-listening experience, much as the iPod
had done 15 years earlier.
APPLE WATCH
Much was riding on the success of the Apple Watch, the first new product to be released by
the company since Jobs’s death. Announced in September of 2014 and launched in April 2015,
the product incorporated fitness and health tracking into Apple’s iOS to provide a small device
that could be worn all the time. It was offered in three collections (Apple Watch Sport, Apple
Watch, and Apple Watch Edition), with prices ranging from $349 for the Watch Sport with a
plastic wristband to $17,000 for the 18-karat gold Watch Edition. Unlike the company’s other
new products, the Apple Watch was not available at Apple Stores on launch day—all
preorders were made online, and the stores only provided fitting service.
The early response to the Apple Watch was mixed. Some felt that the product exhibited
Apple’s attention to detail and elegant design but provided no more functionality than the
smartphone. A short battery life and a steep learning curve were also sources of early
frustration. Most critically, the company had difficulty convincing third-party developers to
offer their apps on the Apple Watch platform. As of July 2015, Facebook, Snapchat, and Google
did not have an Apple Watch app equivalent to their popular iPhone apps, and only five of
the 20 most popular free iPhone apps had Apple Watch versions available. As the New York
Times reported in July 2015, Apple was facing a catch-22 situation; the “companies whose apps
would most likely prompt more people to buy the device are waiting to see who is buying it
and how they use it.” 39 That said, many were optimistic that it was simply a matter of time
before the Apple Watch became a success. They believed that third-party developers would
eventually come up with innovative uses for the device, and that that, along with greater
availability of the product, would solve many of the issues. Prominent Apple analyst Gene
Muster predicted that Apple would be able to sell 14 million Apple Watches in 2016 and that
2017 would be a “breakout year,” with sales of over 40 million units. 40

Page 11 | Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
SOCIAL ISSUES: PAINTING THE APPLE GREEN
With the continuing success of its products and its record-breaking performance, Apple
became more than just a successful business, obtaining cultural icon status. Because of the high
brand loyalty of Apple consumers, the company’s actions on important social and political
issues were also closely watched. Jobs had not seemed particularly interested in such matters.
Unlike his former rival Bill Gates, he had not been a major philanthropist. Although it was
initially unclear whether Cook had a different attitude about the company’s social
responsibilities, after 2011 Apple changed its social policies radically, improved its business
practices, and began to take public positions on important social issues, effectively “painting
the Apple green.” 41
Having been responsible for the global integration of design, manufacturing, and marketing—
and later, in his role as COO—Cook had had the primary decision power over Apple’s
outsourcing. When he came to Apple in 1998 as senior vice president for supply chain
integration, Apple’s logistics were in poor shape, with considerable redundancy, a substantial
inventory, and high costs. Cook shut down in-house manufacturing, moved outsourcing
primarily to Asia, drove down inventory (which he called “fundamentally evil”), and closed
warehouses. 42 However, in 2011 troubles in the supply chain run by contractors such as
FoxConn became headline news in the United States following reports of suicides by
overworked and underpaid workers. Cook started a number of initiatives to improve the
situation, including hiring a third-party NGO to monitor Apple’s supply chains and its
suppliers’ factories. In 2013 Apple hired former EPA administrator Lisa Jackson as its vice
president of environmental initiatives.
As Apple’s stock market valuation increased, the disparity between the wages of its retail store
employees and the compensation of its managers and top executives received more attention,
particularly in light of the debate about job loss and wage stagnation caused by the financial
crisis. Consequently, Apple appeared to be anxious to respond to the public criticism it
received soon after John Browett, a British graduate of the Wharton School who had retail
experience at Tesco in the United Kingdom, was hired with an incentive pay package of over
$50 million. Browett raised workers’ wages, 43 but some of the goodwill that move generated
was squandered when staff and hours were cut. 44 Browett departed after just six months and
received only $3 million of the incentive pay. In subsequent years, several employee suits over
missed lunch breaks or unpaid time for theft checks highlighted the continuing labor-related
challenges at the stores.
Cook also decided that Apple should be a leader in reducing the company’s carbon emission
contribution to global warming. By 2014 all of Apple’s data centers’ energy consumption was
derived from renewable sources; Apple owned the largest solar energy farm in the United
States. In a famous interview, Cook signaled his commitment to addressing global warming
by telling shareholders who didn’t believe in global warming to sell their Apple stock. 45
Apple also made public commitments to diversity through its “inclusion inspires innovation”
campaign. Gender and ethnicity data about the company’s workforce were posted on its
website. 46 Contributing a column to Bloomberg Business, the famously reticent Cook was the

Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy | Page 12


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
first CEO of a Fortune 500 US corporation to declare publicly that he was “proud to be gay.” 47
He explained his reasons for the announcement:
I don’t consider myself an activist, but I realize how much I’ve benefited from
the sacrifice of others. So if hearing that the CEO of Apple is gay can help
someone struggling to come to terms with who he or she is, or bring comfort
to anyone who feels alone, or inspire people to insist on their equality, then it’s
worth the trade-off with my own privacy. 48
Written while many states were challenging a Supreme Court ruling on gay rights, Cook’s
Bloomberg column was viewed as a demonstration of a more tolerant corporate culture in the
United States and elsewhere.

The Future of Apple


By 2015 Apple had become the largest firm in the world in capitalization, twice as the size of
the second-biggest one, Microsoft Corporation. More than three years after Jobs’s death, Cook
had had sufficient time to prove his own mettle as CEO. Still, there were many questions about
the future of the company.
After all, this was not the first time that Apple had been among the leaders of the industries in
which it competed. With 63% of revenues coming from the iPhone, the company faced
considerable investor pressure to demonstrate its future innovative ability to capture value. 49
What had Apple learned from its past about how to renew its ongoing competitive advantage?
What was the best strategy for Cook and his team going forward?

Page 13 | Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Exhibits
Exhibit 1
Apple’s Operating Results 1980-2014
200000 50%

40%
160000

1985 - Microsoft wins rights to 30%


market Windows technology;
Jobs resigns
120000
20%
$ Million

10%
80000

2003 - Windows version 0%


of iTunes introduced
40000
2001 Launch of iPod -10%

0 -20%
1980 1983 1986 1989 1992 1995 1998 2001 2004 2007 2010 2013

Sales (Left Axis) Operating Profit Margin (Right Axis)

Source: Compustat

Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy | Page 14


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Exhibit 2
Relative Market Share for Personal Computer Operating Systems

1985 1995

Apple
21% Other
Other 1%
Microsoft
48% 90%
Microsoft Apple
31% 9%

Source: http://www.jeremyreimer.com/total_share.html (last viewed on July 12, 2010).

Exhibit 3
Relative Price of Computers to GDP

Source: U.S. Department of Commerce

Page 15 | Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Exhibit 4
Value Capture in the PC INDUSTRY

Source: Orit Gadiesh and James L. Gilbert, “Profit Pools: A Fresh Look at Strategy,” Harvard Business
Review, May-June 1998, p. 145

Exhibit 5
iPod Market Share 2001-2006
60.00%

50.00%
2004: Launch of
40.00% iPod shuffle

30.00%
2004: Launch of
iPod Mini
20.00%

2003: Windows version


10.00% of iTunes released

0.00%
2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006

Sources: Euromonitor and Apple Annual Reports

Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy | Page 16


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Exhibit 6
Apple Sales by Product 1998-2007
60,000

50,000
Thousands of units

40,000

iPod
30,000
Portables
Desktops
20,000

10,000

0
1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007

Source: Apple Annual Reports

Page 17 | Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Exhibit 7
U. S. Smartphone Shipments 2005-2007

Source: Needham, “An Investment Analysis by Needham & Company, LLC,” January 2008

Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy | Page 18


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Exhibit 8

Revenue of Wireless Providers 2001-2006

Source: S&P & Thomson Research

Exhibit 9
Comparison of iPhone and Blackberry Bold Economics at AT&T
U.S. $ 3G iPhone BlackBerry Bold
Estimated ASP to carrier ~$650.00 ~$400.00
Estimated subsidy ~$450.00 ~$100.00
Retail price to consumer $199.00-$299.00 $299.00
Estimated monthly data consumption 200 MB 10 MB
Monthly data plan price $30.00 $30.00
Monthly vendor fee charged to carrier $0.00 $6.40
Net monthly data revenue $30.00 $23.60
Revenue per MB $0.15 $2.36
on a $79.99 voice plan for 1,350 on a $79.99 voice plan for 1,350
Typical voice plan revenue per minute minutes AT&T would generate $0.06 minutes AT&T would generate
per minute. $0.06 per minute.
10 MB of bandwidth would
200 MB of bandwidth would provide
provide enough network capacity
enough network capacity for 3,413
for 171 minutes of voice calls. At
minutes of voice calls. At $0.06 per
$0.06 per minute a carrier could
minute a carrier could generate
generate $10.26 compared to the
Equivalent, in voice bandwidth terms $204.78 compared to the $30.00 from
$30.00 from the BlackBerry Bold
the iPhone power-user. In other
power-user. In other words, the
words, the iPhone data plan delivers
BlackBerry data plan delivers the
the equivalent of $0.01 per minute of
equivalent of $0.18 per minute of
voice in revenue.
voice in revenue.

Sources: Company reports and Scotia Capital estimates

Page 19 | Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Exhibit 10
Global Market Share by Mobile OS

Sources: IDC, Strategy Analytics, BI Intelligence Estimates

Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy | Page 20


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Exhibit 11
Most Popular OS by Country, May to July 2015

Sources: StatCounter Global Stats

Page 21 | Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
Endnotes

1 Some information in the early sections of this case are based on Bruce Kogut and Felix
Oberholzer-Gee, The Launch of the Apple iPhone: Seeking Sustained Corporate Growth, Columbia
CaseWorks case #090424 (New York: Columbia University, 2008).
2 Kit Eaton, “Tim Cook, Apple CEO, Auburn University Commencement Speech 2010,” Fast

Company, August 26, 2011, http://www.fastcompany.com/1776338/tim-cook-apple-ceo-


auburn-university-commencement-speech-2010.
3 Kevin O’Marah, “Is Tim Cook a Better CEO Than Steve Jobs?,” Forbes, March 25, 2015,

http://www.forbes.com/sites/kevinomarah/2015/03/25/is-tim-cook-a-better-ceo-than-steve-
jobs/.
4 Jessica E. Vascellaro, “Steve Jobs’s Family Gave Moving Words at Sunday Funeral,” Wall

Street Journal, October 17, 2011, http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2011/10/17/steve-


jobs%E2%80%99s-family-gave-moving-words-at-sunday-memorial/.
5 Craig Zarley, “IBM Allows Channel to Perform Final Assembly on PCs,” Computer Reseller

News, May 29, 1995, 3; Richard N. Langlois, “External Economies and Economic Progress:
The Case of the Microcomputer Industry,” Business History Review 66, no. 1 (Spring 1992): 23,
http://www.jstor.org/stable/3117052.
6 Langlois, “External Economics,” 23.

7 Irene Fuerst, “Apple’s New Push,” Datamation, March 15, 1985, 42.

8 Martin Campbell-Kelly, “Not Only Microsoft: The Maturing of the Personal Computer

Software Industry, 1982–1995,” Business History Review 75, no. 1 (Spring 2001): 110.
9 “Financial Times Survey: The Electronic Office V—Secret of the Best System—Software Is

the Invisible Heart of the Electronic Office, says Alan Cane,” Financial Times, April 13, 1982;
Geoffrey Wheelwright, “Computer Horizons: Desktop Publishing and the Latest Challenges
to Apple,” Times of London, September 30, 1986.
10 Langlois, “External Economics,”26.

11 Langlois, “External Economics,”26.

12 Daniel S. Morrow, “Steve Jobs: Oral History,” Computerworld Honors Program Online

Archives, April 20, 1995, http://www.cwhonors.org/archives/histories/jobs.pdf.


13 Susan Silvius, “iMac vs. Pentium: No Points for Good Looks,” PC World, November 2,

1998, http://www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/9811/09/macvp2.idg/.
14 Charles Wolf, “Apple Inc. (AAPL) — Buy,” Needham and Company Analyst Report, January

3, 2008, 6.
15 Wolf, “Apple Inc. (AAPL) — Buy,” 9.

16 “How to Browse and Buy Music and Books from the iTunes Store,” Apple Computer, May

13, 2008, http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1879.


17 James Coates, “iPod Blazes New Trail on Macs,” San Antonio Express-News, December 2,

2001.
18 “12-Year-Old Sued for Music Downloading,” Fox News, September 9, 2003,

http://www.foxnews.com/story/2003/09/09/12-year-old-sued-for-music-downloading.html.

Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy | Page 22


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
19 May Wong, “Tectonic Change in Music Industry: Apple’s Online Music Coup Ignites a
Budding Industry,” CBS News, May 12, 2003.
20 Scott Morris, “Apple Pips Rivals in Online Music,” Financial Times, June 26, 2003.

21 Morris, “Apple Pips Rivals in Online Music.”

22 “Apple to Sell Music Online at 99 Cents U.S. per Song,” Toronto Star, April 29, 2003.

23 John Borland, “Music Moguls Trumped by Steve Jobs?,” CNET News, April 15, 2005,

http://news.cnet.com/Music-moguls-trumped-by-Steve-Jobs/2100-1027_3-5671705.html.
24 Chris Taylor, “Music & Fashion Invention of the Year: iTunes Music Store,” TIME,

November 16, 2003,


http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1935038_1935059,00.html.
25 Taylor, “Music & Fashion Invention of the Year.”

26 Wolf, “Apple Inc. (AAPL) — Buy,” 2.

27 Darrell Etherington, “Charting the iTunes Store’s Path to 25 Billion Songs Sold, 40 Billion

Apps Downloaded, and Beyond,” TechCrunch, Ferbuary 6, 2013,


http://techcrunch.com/2013/02/06/charting-the-itunes-stores-path-to-25-billion-songs-sold-40-
billion-apps-downloaded-and-beyond/
28 Wolf, “Apple Inc. (AAPL) — Buy,” 2.

29 Geoff Boucher, “Cell Phones Sing Songs of Profit,” Chicago Tribune, December 13, 2004,

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2004-12-13/business/0412130096_1_ring-tones-music-
industry-cellular-phones.
30 Wolf, “Apple Inc. (AAPL) — Buy,” 17.

31 Gus Papageorgiou, “Apple Inc.: iPod, iMac, iPhone, I Hold at This Price,” Scotia Capital

Equity Research Company Report, March 30, 2009, 16.


32 Daniel Cooper, “Visualized: Apple and Samsung Occupy the 99 Percent…of Phone

Profits,” Engadget, May 4, 2012, http://www.engadget.com/2012/05/04/apple-samsung-99-


percent-profits/.
33 Don Reisinger, “Apple’s iPhone Margins Hit 58 Percent, Nearly Double iPad’s,” CNET,

July 27, 2012, http://www.cnet.com/news/apples-iphone-margins-hit-58-percent-nearly-


double-ipads/.
34 Leo Mirini, “Apple’s Admitting the ‘Cheap’ iPhone 5c Failed by Bringing Back the iPhone

4,” Quartz, February 5, 2014, http://qz.com/174031/apples-admitting-the-cheap-iphone-5c-


failed-by-bringing-back-the-iphone-4/.
35 Ben Fox Rubin, “Tablet Sales Expected to Grow, but Just Barely, in 2015,” CNET, March 12,

2015, http://www.cnet.com/news/tablet-sales-expected-to-grow-but-just-barely-in-2015/.
36 Apple, “Apple and IBM Forge Global Partnership to Transform Enterprise Mobility,” news

release, July 15, 2014, https://www.apple.com/pr/library/2014/07/15Apple-and-IBM-Forge-


Global-Partnership-to-Transform-Enterprise-Mobility.html.
37 Alex Heath, “Apple Music Is Full of Bugs,” Business Insider, July 8, 2015,

http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-music-review-buggy-and-too-confusing-2015-7.
38 Jim Dalrymple, “Apple Music is a Nightmare and I’m Done with It,” Loop, July 22, 2015,

http://www.loopinsight.com/2015/07/22/apple-music-is-a-nightmare-and-im-done-with-it/.

Page 23 | Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.
39 Brian X. Chen and Vindu Goel, “Apple Waits As App Developers Study Who’s Buying Its
Watch,” New York Times, July 19, 2015,
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/20/technology/personaltech/apple-waits-as-app-
developers-study-whos-buying-its-watch.html.
40 Benjamin Mayo, “Gene Munster Predicts 3 Million Apple Watch Sales, Thinks 2017 Will Be

the Device’s ‘Breakout’ Year,” 9to5Mac, July 20, 2015, http://9to5mac.com/2015/07/20/gene-


munster-predicts-3-million-apple-watch-sales-thinks-2017-will-be-the-devices-breakout-
year/.
41 Bruge Kogut and Jerry Kim, “Tim Cook’s Leadership Opportunity: Painting the Apple

Green” Wired, March 7, 2012, http://www.wired.com/2012/03/opinion_kogutkim-apple-


green/.
42 Ian Fineman, Tim Cook: The Core of Apple’s Problem (Electronic Tech Press, 2013).

43 Mikey Campell, “Apple Retail Workers Get Significant Pay Bumps Up to 25% of Current

Wages,” Apple Insider,


http://appleinsider.com/articles/12/06/20/apple_retail_workers_get_significant_pay_bumps_
up_to_25_of_current_wages.
44 Richard Blackden, “Former Dixons Boss John Browett Leaves Apple after Just Six Months,”

Telegraph, October 29, 2012,


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/electronics/
9641863/Former-Dixons-boss-John-Browett-leaves-Apple-after-just-six-months.html.
45 Jessica Shankelman, “Tim Cook Tells Climate Change Sceptics to Ditch Apple Shares,”

Guardian, March 3, 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/mar/03/tim-cook-


climate-change-sceptics-ditch-apple-shares.
46 “Diversity,” Apple Inc., https://www.apple.com/diversity/.

47 Timothy Donald Cook, “Tim Cook Speaks Up,” Bloomberg Business, October 30, 2014,

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-10-30/tim-cook-speaks-up.
48 Cook, “Tim Cook Speaks Up.”

49 Lisa Eadicicco, “People Are Clearly Worried That Apple’s ‘Golden Goose’ Is in Trouble,”

Business Insider, July 26, 2015, http://www.businessinsider.com/iphone-apple-earnings-2015-


7.

Apple Inc. in 2015: Vision and Strategy | Page 24


BY BRUCE KOGUT* AND JERRY KIM†

Authorized for use only in Strategy Formulation by Professor Bennett Chiles from August 2018 to November 2018.

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