Apple CEO stepping down, hardware head stepping in

CEO Tim Cook planned to step down from the CEO role and assume the role of Executive Chairman. Cook will officially change titles on Sept. 1, and Senior Vice President of Hardware Engineering John Ternus will become CEO, according to a Monday statement from the company.

Cook first assumed the role of CEO in 2011 and oversaw the company’s introduction of numerous top-selling products, including the Apple Watch, AirPods, iCloud, Apple Pay, and Apple TV. The market value of the company’s stock grew under Cook’s leadership, from $350 billion to $4 trillion, according to a news release from Apple. Cook’s executive chairman role will allow him to continue engaging with the company and policymakers across the globe, according to the company.

What is known about Ternus? The prospective CEO, who has spent nearly his entire career at Apple, described Cook as his mentor. He shared optimism for the company’s future achievements and promised to leave the company with the values and vision that built the company. Ternus joined Apple’s product design team in 2001, before becoming a vice president of Hardware Engineering in 2013, then joining the executive suite in 2021.

Ternus’s work was instrumental in introducing new products like the iPad and AirPods, along with generations of other Apple devices, the company said. He helped introduce new techniques that allowed Apple products to be remarkably resilient, the company added. 

The leadership shake-up came less than a year afterApple announced billions of dollars of investment in its U.S. footprint, including data centers across the country, a manufacturing academy in Michigan, and a 250,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Texas.