Apple announced that its long-time CEO, Tim Cook, will be stepping down, effective Sept. 1.
Cook will be replaced by John Ternus, the company’s senior vice president of hardware engineering. Cook will become executive chairman of the board. Arthur Levinson, who was the non-executive board chair, will become the lead independent director.
“It has been the greatest privilege of my life to be the CEO of Apple,” Cook said in a blog post. “I love Apple with all of my being, and I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to work with a team of such ingenious, innovative, creative, and deeply caring people.”
Ternus brings to the role engineering expertise and institutional knowledge as an Apple veteran of a quarter century.
Cook was handpicked by Jobs to be CEO in 2011. Under his tenure, Apple has introduced the Apple Watch, AirPods and Apple Vision Pro, Apple Pay, iCloud, Apple TV and Apple Music. During his reign, Apple’s market cap expanded from $350 billion to $4 trillion, the company said.
But Cook was also in charge when Apple was criticized for being late to the table in generative AI, with Siri lagging in development behind other AI assistants. When Siri first debuted, it was ahead of its time as the first AI assistant.