“In 1997, Apple was teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. Ten years later, in 2008, it had $24 billion in sales and a total market value of $108 billion — more than that of McDonald’s, Merck and Goldman Sachs,” Nico Carbellano writes for Minyanville.
“Blame it all on Steve Jobs, a man the Apple faithful have compared to Odysseus, Krishna and Jesus Christ. Like that of Jesus, Jobs’ story has humble beginnings, a meteoric rise, a sickening fall – and a show-stopping resurrection,” Carbellano writes.
“In 1976, at the age of 21, Jobs — along with his then-partner, Steve Wozniak — co-founded Apple. Company headquarters could be found in his parents’ garage, in the space once occupied by Jobs’ Volkswagen bus; he was forced to sell it to finance the design of the Apple I computer,” Carbellano writes. “But by the age of 25, Jobs was worth $200 million; by age 30 — thanks to his infamously erratic management style — he was summarily forced out of the company he himself had built. In the decade after his departure (between 1985 and 1996), Apple steadily lost market share and hemorrhaged money by the billions. In desperation, Gil Amelio, Apple’s then-CEO, moved to acquire NeXT, the computer company Jobs founded after his departure.”
Carbellano writes, “Amelio was uncharacteristically blunt about his reasons for the acquisition: ‘I’m not buying [NeXT]. I’m buying Steve.'”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Peter M.” for the heads up.]
