Expressed by Business Insider writer, Dave Smith, Apple may have succeeded in the 80's with some of its product line such as Apple II and Macintosh computers, but was in trouble in 1997. The company's sales dropped by 30% from the year before. The company was selling a lot of products to the point where different versions are available for a line, but was not been able to be marketed on its differences. Stockholders were shaky about the management. As Dave said, "there was no focus."
When Apple's SVP for marketing, Phil Schiller, who was with Macromedia that time, told Walter Isaacson, Steve Jobs' biographer, that "it was insanity,", "Tons of Products, most of them crap, done by deluded teams."
Then Steve Jobs returned to the company that he co-founded
At the latter part of 1997, by September, Steve Jobs removed 70% of Apple's product selections and got out of non-core business such as printers and servers. Jobs also told a development group that they are bright people that should not waste time on useless things.
The abrupt strategy change is what greatly saved the company that time of need. In doing so, Apple has let go of couple of thousands of employees, but that did balance things out on financial papers. By the start of the year after, Steve Jobs then finally declared that Apple was profitable in years.
The return of Jobs, became a trendsetting occurrence internally in Apple, to stay focused on a manageable amount of products, and make them work, really work to perfection.
Being the heads of the design team, Steve Jobs and Jony Ive, made sure that the core mission of being minimalist was maintained, and ensured that products, and all other business perspectives was aligned. The result was success.
The following product line, such as the iPod, iPhone and the iPad, took the world by its head and changed the mindset and perspective of people on how to deal and communicate with technology, then the company became the biggest and the most sought after company in the world.
Sadly, cancer, took Steve Jobs life early 2011, ever since his partner Ive's presence in the company has been less noticeable. After the recent releases of Apple this year, there's a hint of doubt and worry about Apple without Jobs and Ive.
Two decades after, it is as if Apple is in the same rut again. 46 models of different hardware line, from Computers, Laptops, Phones and Tablets, but more than that, it is the accompanying legitimate complaints with the products released.
Apple may be encountering this because of the company's focus on future projects. Apple has been discussed as working on smart glasses, autonomous driving car system, and they are several years from launching with a number of people working with it.
On the other side, many current products are seemingly placed aside or neglected. Such as iTunes, Mac Pro, to the point that there is no minor refresh jut to keep its chipset up to par.
To any problem, there will always be a time to fix it and turn around the situation. The most probable key would be, like the time Steve Jobs returned to the company, is focus. Minimize, Execute perfectly, it would be difficult to know if what would Steve Jobs retain and cut from the current line up and what projects to do and not. Bottom-line, the company needs focus on their current products before moving on to new projects. As of the writer's opinion, hopefully all goes well.
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