The Life Story of Apple Group

We wish to enlighten others about the journey of the company, Apple. We will inform you about the ups and downs, the rise and fall that the company experienced. Furthermore, we aim to illustrate how the company has changed our world and the way we use technology. Along with this, we will highlight the early beginnings of the company; how it got started, and who the founders were. Moreover, we will discuss the company’s rebirth and potential prospects for its future.

Essentially, our goal is to inform people about the life story of Apple. Our topic revolves around the history of the IT company, Apple. The reason we chose to discuss Apple’s story is that we believe people know too little about its early beginnings. Apple is one of the most successful technology and information companies in the world. Therefore, we found it ironic that only a few people seem to know the story of how it got started, which propelled us to narrate it.

On the other hand, we aim to start by explaining how the company was created. We also intend to provide a brief insight into the lives and personalities of the company’s founders. We deem it crucial to understand the beginning, the rise and fall, and the rebirth of the company’s business activities. Apple Inc is an American multinational technology company currently headquartered in Cupertino, California. Apple designs, develops, and markets technological products such as personal devices and software services. It is best known for its mobile communication devices, the iPhone, along with other products like the MacBook and iPad. Apple was founded on April 1, 1976, in Palo Alto, California. The company was established by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak (Woz). Prior to founding Apple, Steve Jobs had just dropped out of Reed College and was working at a tech gaming company named Atari when he met his friend and co-founder of Apple, Steve Wozniak. Steve Wozniak was working as a software developer at Hewlett-Packard at this time. They allegedly met through a mutual friend and found that they both enjoyed the same things – pranks and a deep passion for electronics.

According to the research Steve Wozniak had built this electronic device for making free calls and it was the idea of Steve jobs to begin to sell theses devices. Steve Wozniak had agreed, so Woz began making more and Steve jobs begin to sell them and split the profit with Woz. According to both Founders this was the birth of Apple. Steve Jobs had this vison of selling electronic devices and computers that could actually be used inside people’s homes. On the other hand Steve Wozniak wasn’t too excited early on about creating a company. He loved creating and designing and coding electronics. Steve Wozniak also didn’t want to leave his well-paying job at Hewlett-Packard. It wasn’t until Steve jobs convinced Woz to help him build the company, finally he agreed. So apple was created, but on the other hand one of the most asked questions when people analysis the story of apple was how the company got its name. Well the way apple got its name was Steve jobs stated in his novel with Walter Isaacson. That he was on his fruit diet and had just came back from an apple farm and thought that the name was fun and full with sprite and was not intimidating. The original goal for the Apple during this time was to create computers that were not so expensive and could be used by ordinary people in their homes. So Steve Jobs and Woz in the early days of apple existence started building what thy called the Apple 1 in the garage of Steve jobs parents’ house. Both Steve jobs and Steve Wozniak sated that they really were building these products for them to use. Because during that time period Steve and Woz didn’t see or have inexpensive computers or electronic devices that they could use for themselves. So they built their own computers for their own benefits. At the time the Apple 1 was not at all a device does that looks like the average computers that we have today.

Fundamentally they were created in a way that an individual could hook up some form of a key board and write out very slowly what you wanted to see on a screen or monitor. The Apple 1 did not include a monitor, or keyboard or even a casing. The apple 1 was pretty much a motherboard that was sold and could be put in a keyboard with a casing so that a person at home during that time could connect there tv or some monitor to the keyboard and write out and see what they wrote. Contrary to belief at the time this was an incredible idea for ordinary people to have access to a in expensive computer in their home, for us to day we take it for granted. Originally the way that they would manufacture the products is that Steve and Woz would take equipment and parts from Atari and Hewlett-Packard. Steve and Woz had hired some friends from their neighborhood to help them with the manufacturing product. Research showed that Steve jobs turned his parents’ home into a small startup business. Steve jobs stated in his novel with Walter Isaacson that he would give everybody a small task to do and then they would pass the down the line kind of like an assembly line.

Every computer they built was made by hand, coded by Steve Wozniak, and managed by Steve Jobs. However, this wasn’t always the case. Everything changed when Steve Jobs met a businessman who would help jump-start Apple’s creations financially. At that time, the company had just launched a product that would form the basis for Apple’s early success. In 1977, Steve Jobs and Wozniak built what they called the Apple II; a family home computer, and one of the very successful mass-produced microcomputers, designed primarily by Wozniak. This computer moved Apple out of Steve Jobs parents’ house and transformed it into a household name. The Apple II revolutionized the entire computer industry influencing how computers look today. Notably, it was the first computer to integrate color graphics in the software. With a keyboard, monitor, and computer casing, the Apple II was a good model for computers at that time. The success of the Apple II was impressive, with company sales soaring from $7.8 million to over $100 million. These products reshaped the way we integrate technology into our lives today.

This was Apple’s first experience of what it’s like to change the world. Despite Apple’s new found success, it was still considered a small company compared to its competitors, such as IBM and even HP. Steve Jobs was never satisfied. During the success of the Apple II, he felt the company should keep innovating and growing, striving to surpass its competitor, IBM. Jobs believed IBM was doing things wrong concerning the future of computers. As a result, in 1980, Apple Computer Company decided to go public. When it did, the company generated more capital from its IPO than any company since Ford Motor Company in 1956. During this period, Apple rose from being a start-up in Steve Jobs’ garage to a Fortune 500 company worth nearly $2 billion, with annual revenues of hundreds of millions.

The company was striving to become a true dominating company that would forever change the tech products business. At the age of 25, Steve Jobs would be running this large corporation. Even Steve Jobs at the time knew and felt he wasn’t ready to run a multimillion-dollar corporation. The Apple board also stated that the company needed an adult CEO to run the company and that they would sign off on whomever he chose. Therefore, Steve Jobs announced in 1983 that John Sculley would be the CEO of Apple. Steve Jobs would be named the chairman of Apple and could choose any team and also hire anyone he wanted. Prior to becoming the CEO of Apple, John Sculley served as the CEO of Pepsi. John Sculley stated that he initially refused Jobs’s offer, but Jobs looked at him and said, “Do you want to keep selling soda water, or do you want to come with me and change the world?” This seemed like a great partnership at the time, but it later turned into a disaster that led to some of the worst days of Apple’s existence. Despite Apple’s new success and newfound growth in the technological sector, there was still a problem on the horizon. Many employees at Apple felt that the way Steve Jobs managed the company and treated his employees created a negative and toxic working environment. For instance, Apple introduced its latest product.

On January 19, 1983, Apple introduced the Lisa. The Lisa is a desktop computer and it was the first personal computer to offer a graphical user interface in a machine aimed at individual business users. However, many felt the computer was too expensive and although some customers found the product user-friendly, it was not well received or understood by its primary audience. The company only sold 100,000 units, primarily to universities and colleges, as well as to successful businesses and corporations. The company’s vision was to create a computer that could be used by anybody, and that individuals didn’t need a college computer science degree to use. This created ongoing conflict between Steve Jobs, John Sculley, and the board.

According to research, Steve Jobs wanted to invest more in the Lisa, but the board and John Sculley refused. The board wanted to put more money into the Apple 2, but Jobs refused to let the company stop innovating. This decision by the board resulted in them stripping Steve Jobs of the Lisa team, leaving him no choice but to join the Macintosh team. The Macintosh was the first mass-marketed personal computer, featuring a graphical user interface with a built-in mouse and screen. It’s true that Microsoft adapted these user interface concepts for its first Windows operating system. The Macintosh was launched in 1984 and cost roughly $2,495. The price for such a computer at that time was not particularly popular.

Also, the board of Apple was not happy with the way that Steve Jobs was managing his team. Even though Jobs was at odds with John Sculley and wanted the board to fire him, they refused. When Jobs ultimatum came down to either firing him or John, the board chose to let Jobs go. This decision led Apple down a terrible path that almost resulted in bankruptcy. Under Sculley’s leadership, innovation was lacking, and he was later let go. The company then hired Michael Spindler from 1993 to 1996 – until he, too, was fired because of his failure to produce profitable products. In 1996, the company hired Gil Amelio, but he lost his job when Steve Jobs was asked to return in 1997. Apple is renowned as one of the most financially innovative companies in the United States and the world. In 1997, Jobs rejoined Apple as interim CEO and in 2000 he became the permanent CEO. Initially, Apple faced significant challenges, having a limited share in the computer market. In 2001, its sales of $5.3 billion were less than half of what they had been six years prior, and the company was operating at a loss. However, with the launch of the iPod and the first Apple retail store in 2001, Apple began a significant transformation; moving from purely a computer maker into a multimedia powerhouse.

In 2003, the online iTunes store debuted, giving a significant boost to iPod sales. Prior to the launch of the iPhone in 2006, the company saw an increase in total sales to $19.3 billion, fifty percent of which were from iPods and iTunes. Then, in 2007, the first generation of the iPhone launched introducing a product that combined a widescreen iPod with touch controls, a revolutionary mobile phone, and a breakthrough internet connector. They sold 6.1 million units of the first generation iPhone alone. Apple released the first iPad in 2010 and sold 15 million units that same year. By the beginning of 2011, iPhone sales had reached $36.1 billion, and iPad sales were $13.5 billion, together accounting for 62% of Apple’s total revenues.

From 2006 to 2010, Apple increased its U.S. stores from 147 to 233, and its U.S. retail employees grew from an estimated 5,200 to 19,500, representing about half of Apple’s total worldwide employee growth. Apple’s growth is attributed to the company’s blend of engineering professionals creating consumer-focused products with signature graphical user interfaces. A study on jobs and wages in the iPod value chain in 2006 calculated that Apple employed 6,100 managers, engineers, and professionals in iPod-related work. The company has long been valuable; in December 1980, Apple raised about $100 million in its initial public offering. Since then, virtually all of the company’s financial growth has been from retained earnings plus about $4.3 billion from the sale of stock to employees as part of compensation plans.

In fact, Apple raised more money from the public stock market between 1986 and 1993. Under CEO Sculley, the company wasted $1.8 billion buying back its own stock, and another $191 million of buybacks were done under CEO Jobs in 1999-2000. Between 1987 and 1996, Apple also paid out $457 million in dividends but has not paid any dividends since then. In the mid-1990s, the company took on debt of almost $1 billion, largely to cover losses. However, since 2003 it has been debt-free. Apple ignited the personal computer revolution in the 1970s with the Apple II and reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the Macintosh. Today, Apple continues to lead the industry in innovation with its award-winning computers, OS X operating system, and iLife and professional applications. Apple is also leading the digital media revolution with its iPod portable music and video players, iTunes online store, and it has entered the mobile phone market with its revolutionary iPhone.

Did you like this example?

237

12