Apple CEO Tim Cook on Apple Watch note that hit him particularly hard; says: It caused me to just stop in …
Tim Cook has announced to step down from the Apple CEO role later this year, naming John Ternus as his successor. During a town hall meeting after the announcement, Cook shared how a note from a user after the first Apple Watch launch hit me “particularly hard”. Recalling moments that is of proud of during his tenure, Cook fondly remembered how one incident involving Apple Watch and its health benefits stand out. “I remember getting the very first Apple Watch note from a user who told me that the watch saved their life,” Cook said during the town hall as reported by Bloomberg. “Now, of course, I get these on a daily basis, but that first one hit me particularly hard. It caused me to just stop in my steps,” he added.
Apple CEO Tim Cook reveals his “first really big mistake”
During the town hall meeting, Tim Cook also reflected on his mistakes as Apple CEO. Cook, as per the report, said that the list of mistakes he made would be “extraordinary in length,” but the company mostly avoided the kind of product recalls and cancellations that have plagued other consumer device companies over the last 15 years.He cited the launch of Apple Maps on the iPhone in 2012 as HIS “first really big mistake”. Apple Maps app then faced major issues in many parts of the world, like giving users incorrect directions and mislabeling landmarks, in comparison to Google Maps on the iPhone at the time. “The product wasn’t ready, and we thought it was because we were testing more of local kind of stuff,” Tim Cook said.“We apologised for it, and we said, ‘Go use these other apps. They’re better than ours.’ And that was some humble pie,” Cook said. “But it was the right thing for our users. And so it’s an example of keeping the user at the centre of the decisions that we made.”Tim Cook further added: “Now we’ve got the best map app on the planet. We learned about persistence, and we did exactly the right thing having made the mistake.” The launch eventually led to a major management change during Tim Cook’s tenure, as he removed software chief Scott Forstall from his role, Bloomberg report says. Forstall had been a close collaborator of Apple co-founder and Tim Cook’s predecessor Steve Jobs.Other than Apple Maps launch, some missteps during Cook’s tenure included the failed launch of an AirPower wireless charging mat and an unsuccessful decadelong quest to make a self-driving car.
