Has Steve Jobs left a Four Year Plan at Apple?

Steve Jobs famously was Apple.  He ignored focus groups in favour of his own gut instinct and, as such, the latest rumour doing the rounds could well turn out to be completely true.  The Times newspaper in the UK has reported that before his death last week, Steve Jobs left a clear four year product roadmap for the company.

The newspaper claims that the next generation iPhone, due in late 2012 or 2013 will be a Jobs ‘legacy device’. and that he had been working closely on Apple’s next generation cloud services platform during his last few months with the company.

Of the products reportedly part of this four-year roadmap are a touch-screen television that would supersede the underwhelming Apple TV and a new iCloud to take on rivals Google and Microsoft.

To be honest all of this could just be idle speculation and guesswork, as it is relatively simple to determine what Apple’s product roadmap will realistically be in the next few years.  There will definitely be an iPhone 5 announcement sometime around Q4 2012 and Apple will inevitably announce a product to try and capture back some of the living room that Microsoft have so successfully made its mark in during recent years.

It could turn out to be the iCloud that becomes Jobs’ legacy however.  Currently the cloud is owned by Microsoft with it’s SkyDrive, Office Live, Office 365, Hotmail and Xbox Live services being the only truly connected set of cloud services available.  Not even Google, with all of its experience and might in cloud services, has been able to produce something that comes close to rivalling them.

The popularity of Apple’s mobile platforms however could mean that a revamped iCloud of music, photo, backup, sharing and communication, could very well be the next big thing for the company.  It pretty much rests on how interconnected such services would be, how deeply integrated they would be with both OS X and iOS and whether they would be free.  Apple’s previous attempt to charge for their cloud services haven’t proved popular.

Any rumours and speculation that Apple may in the next 12 months release a product with a name or branding specifically aimed at being a tribute to Steve Jobs, such as perhaps a special edition iPhone 4SJ, are just that, pure speculation.  Apple will need to prove that the company is much bigger than one man, something the markets will have little doubt of given the strengths of individuals in the top team that Jobs put together including Tim Cook and Jonathan Ive.  Consumers however might find a Jobs tribute product rather  more an admission of how much the company really needed him.

It will be interesting to see where Apple take their products, not in 2012 as these would be things in which Jobs would have been directly and personally involved, but in 2013 onwards, and how they respond to competitors products such as Windows 8.  Will the magic leave Apple with the death of it’s co-founder?  Probably not, but there will still be a fight on by the current top team to prove that this isn’t the case.

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© Mike Halsey (MVP) for gHacks Technology News | Latest Tech News, Software And Tutorials, 2011. | Permalink |
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Apple Founder Steve Jobs Dies aged 56

Apple co-founder and the man responsible for making the company so successful in recent years has died at the age of 56.  Jobs had been suffering from pancreatic cancer since 2004.  He took medical leave from the company in January this year before handing over the role of CEO to Tim Cook in August.

In his resignation letter he said “I believe Apple’s brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it. And I look forward to watching and contributing to its success in a new role.”

In a statement about his death, Apple said “brilliance, passion and energy were the source of countless innovations that enrich and improve all of our lives. The world is immeasurably better because of Steve”.

There can be little doubt of Steve Jobs’ contribution to the world of computing and modern technology.  He was previously forced out of Apple by the then board of directors in 1985 but was brought back when the company was on the bring of bankruptcy in 1996.

Steve Jobs meeting Bill Gates in 1981

After this time he spectacularly turned around the company’s fortunes firstly with the iMac and then with the iPod.  Under his leadership, Apple reimagined a series of spectacularly failed products and made them hugely popular, capturing worldwide markets in smartphones and tablets.  At the time of his death Apple is firmly on top and is also currently the biggest technology company in the world in terms of value.

Jobs had a reputation as a forthright and very demanding CEO who knew exactly what types of products should be released and what they should do.  While many of his decisions have been criticised, including some business practices he instigated at Apple, there can be no doubt his contribution to technology is immeasurable.  This brusque attitude occasionally came to light though, at no time more obviously than the notorious iPhone 4 antennagate affair when he reportedly told a phone owner “don’t hold it that way then.”

It is the general public around the world who Jobs’ work touched so much and there have been tributes pouring into Twitter, some of which are included below.

“You left your mark on our desk, on our ears and in our hands”

“You made the world a more interesting place.  A leading light in technology has been extinguished.”

“It’s sad to find out of your death from a device you created.”

“He had the most gifted mind.”

“Thank you for dreaming, believing and creating a world of infinite possibilities.  Your legacy will live forever.”

“RIP Steve Jobs, sent from my iPhone”

You can read more tributes on Twitter here.

US President Barack Obama said the world had “lost a visionary .  Steve was among the greatest of American innovators – brave enough to think differently, bold enough to believe he could change the world, and talented enough to do it.”

Here is an inspirational speech he held in 2005:

Steve Jobs was born in San Francisco, California in February 1955 to a Syrian-born couple and was later adopted by a working-class Californian couple.  In his early working life he worked at both HP and Atari but he dropped out of college and travelled to India for a while where he studied Buddhism.

He founded Apple in 1976 with his school friend Steve Wozinack.  Other high profile companies he has owned previously include NeXT computer and movie animation studio Pixar,

He leaves his wife Lauren and three children.

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© Mike Halsey (MVP) for gHacks Technology News | Latest Tech News, Software And Tutorials, 2011. | Permalink |
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