“A snowballing new ‘whisper campaign’ is targeting Apple’s chief executive Tim Cook as being poor choice to run the company and a likely candidate for replacement in the months following its most successful quarter ever,” Daniel Eran Dilger writes for AppleInsider. “The latest rumor, tweeted by Doug Kass, attributed a “cooking” of Cook to an alpine gnome source. Kass gained notoriety just two months ago for making a similar prediction that Apple would split its stock, before admitting that such a split would be impossible.”
“After setting new records in quarterly revenues and profits and completely revamping nearly every hardware line with new products (establishing a new world’s favorite smartphone with iPhone 5 and introducing a pair of what would become the world’s favorite tablets with iPad 4 and the new iPad mini) Apple found itself under new scrutiny looking for signs of impending failure and crisis,” Dilger writes. “Several analysts have voiced concerns that Apple’s margins might drop from twice the size of its competitors to being slightly less than twice that of the overall PC and phone industries it operates in. This might force Apple to make some adjustments to help it retain its roughly 75 percent share of the profits in the vast PC, smartphone, mobile software and media downloads markets it currently dominates. That’s a task most chief executives would love to have.”
Dilger writes, “Cook hasn’t presided over any loss in revenues or profits. Instead, as Cook announced just three months ago, ‘we’re thrilled with record revenue of over $54 billion and sales of over 75 million iOS devices in a single quarter. We’re very confident in our product pipeline as we continue to focus on innovation and making the best products in the world.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Again:
We wouldn’t bet against him. – MacDailyNews Take, regarding Tim Cook, December 12, 2012
Of course the anti Apple crowds wanna oust Tim. That means Steve Jobs is wrong again… Tim is just like another Scully. History repeats itself, Apple is going to lose to the evils however hard they work on innovating the best products to us…
aapl should buy Twitter and bring Jack Dorsey on board. And have TC still run the operations as he’s doing now.
Thank you. Until this post I hadn’t seen anybody suggest a successor for Cook. Which has of course been one of the most frustrating things about this whole debate. How can people say “Cook must go” without can least saying who might be better than him at running the huge company that Apple has become.
I’ve sat on the sidelines of this debate (I’m not a shareholder so I don’t give a fig for who runs the company, all I care about is product) and come to the conclusion that maybe some powerful commenters are homophobes who don’t like an openly gay CEO in charge of a successful company. (And I’m straight so I’m not grinding an axe here).
ER,,,,error … error….. I think you mis-understood. I think KFT was talking about bringing in a talking head to be the front man and have Tim Cook still run the company.
And since you do not care about stock price only product, then you should be tickled pink (no pun intended) that Tims in charge as the product seems to be doing great so far.
JAT>
As the wolves quote themselves they disagree with facts. As they glorify jobs they go on to vilify tim. But about the only thing they can’t do is ignore them. Because Apple change things. They invent. They imagine. They heal. They explore. They create. They inspire. They push the human race forward. And no, no one’s perfect. Greed filled predators will pray. Fear and doubt will pursue. As if a racehourse was in pasture, the sparks subsided, a champion is still a champion. Lives were enriched, of the young and old, far and wide. But don’t believe the engine is out, drowned out a little in the eff-you-dee maybe, but not down and not out. With the misfits lives Tim. And with Tim lives Jobs. What they have done already belittle’s any wolf, and what you are crazy enough to think they will do again, they will be the ones who do.
All this negativity needs to be put in the right perspective. Enjoy. Inspired from: “Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They invent. They imagine. They heal. They explore. They create. They inspire. They push the human race forward. Maybe they have to be crazy. How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art? Or sit in silence and hear a song that’s never been written? Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels? We make tools for these kinds of people. While some see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”
What WS and shareholders forget, is that Tim and BoD are also shareholders. They’re the main people interested in make the shares more valuable. Managing a company like Apple is not trivial, it’s not a matter of launch a better product spec or lower the price, or even hire the best mind. There’re so many factors that no little Joe can handle. Tim was chosen by Steve, I don’t believe Steve will have done the same mistake twice!
Years ago I remember watching an F1 race. Someone asked something like “why doesn’t that guy just hammer the gas and pass the leader?”. The racing guys we were with laughed and said “they’re both driving at full-throttle already. Everyone is”. The point being, it looks a lot easier from the outside.
I simply wouldn’t trust anyone else with the job. Tim Cook is the best, and everyone who knows anything knows that. If someone’s calling for Tim Cook to step aside, they’re not interests in Spple’s well-being. The modern (successful) Apple of the last 15 years is due in no small part to Mr. Cook himself. Jobs didn’t hand the company to Cook. Cook built the thing.
How anyone can take – SPECIFICALLY – Doug Kass seriously is simply beyond me. I could not give two “merdas” about anything he says. Scroll to real news and stop giving this clown any airtime.
Kass is working his way to jail.
He’s a looser. A real annoying looser.
“Looser?” As opposed to what- “tighter?”
Wall street analysts ARE indeed whores.
I wonder who is behind this crap….Google, Samsung or what the heck is going on.
for sure it’s not those Wall Street clown that wanted Tim out,
see how they were able to manipulate the price? they’re all having
a good time shorting AAPL. With Tim on the helm and not doing anything with the FUDs , it’s so easy for those clowns to keep going and going. Apple’s present strategy is just perfect for anal ysts to
manipulate every rumors, FUD, earnings etc.
It may be some other forces that want Timmy out!
Samsung Securities has my vote for the FUD propaganda factory of the year.
I can’t believe all the bull about Tim Cook, He’s doing a great job and has had record profits for Apple.
How about get rid of Ballmer, but then again we like what Ballmer’s doing and we like it allot!!
Hey maybe we can have a youtube video, but replace Britney Spears with Tim Cook.
“LEAVE IM COOK ALONE !!!” 😉
Long live Apple and Tim Cook, “Haters are going to hate” as they say and the problem is those few very loud haters have no scruples and you really can’t win against Stupid.
OK, so whom do we blame at Apple for the massive iMac supply screwup last quarter . . . if not Tim Cook? Jonny Ive? Bob Mansfield? WHOM?
Isn’t Tim supposed to be the incomparable supply genius? The great organizer? The “let’s always make sure we have some of this product to sell” guy? Yes?
Sorry: NO! Timmy screwed up on an epic scale last quarter, the market saw it, and he has to go. He simply does not have the gravitas to lead and inspire what used to be the most valuable company on earth.
FACT: In their tenure, both he and Steve Ballmer managed to HALVE the value of the companies they took over from their founders. True or false? And you know how we all feel about the Redmond Monkey Boy.
Tim Cook is a miserable failure as a corporate boss. Someone else AT APPLE must be given the leadership reins at this point; let Tim find something else to do within the company walls if such is his choice. But he MUST GO . . . and soon, while there is something left to love in Cupertino.
You’re so right. That lost sale of 700K iMacs was such a huge screw up that the guy who built a supply chain capable of turning on a dime yet delivering 100M iPads has got to go.
/s
Dear usher iii,, I hear that Samdung has cut back on payments to its trolls, to try and hide from the new court case.
Hope this drop in cash has not hurt your wallet much.
PS keep saying this to your self….:
marketshare is everything even if you lose money on each unit… just ask Dell
Profit and cash do not mean anything. Bragging BS is the best…
JAT>
Usher III nice attempt at trolling, but it won’t fly here. By your warped and twisted logic Steve Jobs should have been tossed out in Fall of 2004 when the urban legendary 3 GHZ G5 failed to materialize. That would have left the world bereft of both the iPhone and iPad.
So what if Apple had a mislaunched iMac. The brand new never used before Apple manufacturing process had a hiccup. Its feeling much better now thanks, and no other product on the market can touch the new iMac. (Although to be fair, a new Mac Pro would help) During this screw up Apple still had record breaking revenue and profits, so why the kvetching at Apple? If you don’t like the outlook of AAPL, go to the source, the manipulating bastards of WS.
And screw your stupid comparison of Ballmer and Cook. MS stock has been flatline for almost 15 years now. Apple stock is still higher than when Jobs died and Cook took over. It will be much higher very soon.
If Apple needs a new anything (besides a mac pro) it would be a master presenter/ PR presentation person to do the actual product announcements.
I love Apple products, but some Apple fans are just delusional.
You can’t name one single innovation Tim Cook is responsible for since he took over… oh yeah, that’s right, the $45 iOS device adapter. Thanks Tim. This made my pockets so much lighter!
This guy is boring, has no personality, is virtually non-communicative, has rode Jobs’ coattails into the ground, is personally responsible for a quarter billion in market cap meltdown but he still gets a bonus?
Famous Tim Cook Mistakes: Prematurely obsoleting the iPad 3. Releasing the iPad mini without HD screen. Firing Scott Forstall. Blowing the iMac launch. Giving shareholders a dividend (now they expect the world).
If they don’t toss this Twinkie now, Apple’s stock will hit a hundred bucks very soon.
Randy, really?. We have the iPad mini which is a hit. The new iMac, Thunderbolt technology, fusion drives, iPhone 5. You have no faith in the Apple product cycle of the last 10 years.
Go get a Samsung and leave this place.
Single-handidly responsible for what? Let’s roll the tape back to the end of Q4FY12 when Tim gave guidance for Q1FY13. Please compare the guidance to the actuals. Apple beat on most of their guidance. What “missed” and caused the stock price to tumble was the expectations the analysts had concluded based upon their checks with unnamed sources in the supply chain. Guess what’s continuing this quarter? Those same analysts are checking with their same unnamed sources. So I expect history to repeat: Apple will beat guidance and miss expectations. And I will continue to trust Apple management and you will continue to call for Tim’s head.
Wow, even a deaf dumb and blind squirrel can find a nut once in a blue moon. Congrats, your shot in the dark straw grasping came up with a valid point; giving the greedy shareholders a dividend. Anyone stupid enough to gamble in a game fixed worse than Vegas doesn’t deserve a dividend/free handout. Selling the stock when its high is the reward, and if you don’t know how to play the game, get out. Simple
When a company loses half its value, the CEO is usually pushed out and drifts safely to the ground under his $$$$$$$$$$ parachute. Such should be the next move for Tim Cook. He’s done. The company requires new leadership. Nobody on Wall Street has any faith in him at all. His reassurance of what’s in the product pipeline is a promise he has failed to deliver and he has no credibility. I know this is a site only for Apple worshipers who believe Steve’s chosen successor can do no wrong. But, nobody is listening to fanbois. AAPL is a $300 stock or hasn’t anyone noticed?
As Steve Jobs said, a CEO cannot control Wall Street beyond posting record profits, record cash and record demand for their products.
Amazon has no cash, no profit and no plan to change course yet their stock is rising while their P/E lives in fantasy land.
I love Amazon as a customer but their business plan is straight out of Voodoo economics.
But it’s working out very well for Amazon shareholders. Apple has been proven the antithesis of Amazon. Why? Because Jeff Bezos seems to be able to excite investors.
If you remain a shareholder then this too shall pass. If you panicked and sold at a loss that was your decision. If you sold at a profit then that was your decision.
Notice how you can’t spell “Tim Cook” with the letters in “your decision”?
Hey—I believe you’ve hit on it! The solution to the puzzle, I mean, of why the most well-designed company of our time, a towering example of excellence, can hit the skids in the minds of millions.
The key is the “minds”. As science has conclusively proven, human minds are readily manipulated in any number of ways, including self-delusion. Thus Voodoo works, and this could be why I noticed shrunken heads in a display cabinet at a recent visit to the Goldman Sachs Surveillance Analytics Group, and it also explains the charming Steve Jobs doll stuck with 13 hat pins that is displayed in the ladies’ room at Beckett’s, one of their watering holes.
“When a company loses half its value, the CEO is usually pushed out and drifts safely to the ground under his $$$$$$$$$$ parachute. Such should be the next move for Tim Cook.”
Apple is still as valuable as it was when the outstanding shares were over $700. The AAPL shares are below $400, the Apple Inc. company is still doing fine.
That’s your problem, andy Anderson. You just care about your shares. Your beef is with Wall Street.
Tim Cook runs the most profitable company on earth. He doesn’t have the time to worry about your shares.
Wall Street is FUBAR
I believe shareholders just want to shake up the company and the stock out of frustration. Why did Apple shareholders have to be the only ones to lose close to 50% of their stock while the rest of the stock market gained close to 10%? All this while Apple is still considered a rather profitable company. Who else can shareholders vent their anger at? Tim Cook seemed to be making a pretty decent salary and most investors still believe a CEO’s salary should be based on how well they increase shareholder gains.
There’s no guarantee another CEO would do any better, but I guess there certainly are shareholders who figure another CEO couldn’t do worse than Tim Cook. No shareholder enjoys taking massive losses so dumping Cook is all they can think of to hopefully change the situation.
Correction: Cook is responsible for a quarter “Trillion” dollar meltdown!
But you naive Apple followers will keep saying… “Give him more time”.
More time to do what?
Make Apple disappear altogether?
Cook had nothing to do with the meltdown. They just had the most lucrative quarter in the history of electronic quarters. Isn’t profit the most important metric?
Apple Inc. is doing fine. Wall Street is screwing with your stocks. Phone the SEC if you want justice.
Bravo. Bravo. This manipulation must end, people should be going to jail for all this obfuscation.
I love that Dilger is still writing the real story. There is no reason whatsoever for what is going on right now, and if I was Apple I would lose these guys and go private. F*** ’em!
Stock market is a gamble. If the shareholders are not willing to loose then do not play, period! The shareholders that are playing only to speculate and make easy money deserve the axe of the share’s price. What’s the reason a company goes public? Isn’t that to finance their operations and R&D? And then pay dividends to the shareholders. I wish Apple shares goes as low as it make viable to become private! And f…k the vultures shareholders!
As soon as Apple’s cash hoard approaches its market cap, there won’t be a way for AAPL to go lower.
Apart from this, my only question is: who benefits from the speculation against AAPL? Not the electronics industry. If they are not targeting AAPL, they will be targeting some other company. Is it normal that a mechanism exists that constantly drains money from the industry (more exactly put: from shareholders, ie., people who THINK they are supporting industry) ? How productive is that?
Some people claim that the stock market plays an important role in our economy. Even if this is partly true at all, then it is still high time to drastically revise the stock market model, such that it may help the economy to recover, rather than trying to starve it to death.
Now this stuff is “FUD” Jobs liked Tim and picked him for a reason. I see ZERO need to fire him. The world of tech is different since Steve passed. Give him 6 years. Plus, the market makers could short the crap out of it and kill the stock even if Steve was still there. What is so different now. Not a whole lot.
BUT:
“Tim’s not a product person, per se,”
Steve Jobs to Walt Isaacson in his bio.
And Jobs said it as a big “BUT” in terms of being confident with him. In other words, Jobs thought highly of Tim except for this one big BUT. And a big one it is.
It’s really becoming quite sad now that they are going to target one individual. Someone who has stayed the course this whole time.
I wish I could light them all on fire and watch them burn.
I betcha ppeterson started this whole thing.
FUD!!!!!!!!
I think that Apple is completely own, and run by Steve. if somebody like Tim tries to run the company as the same position, it would be fallen sooner than expected because Apple is literally Steve. without him, Apple won’t be standing, and make big grow again. it’s only little over year. even though economy has been bad, apple stock lost 40% of value less than year (6-7 months). if Steve would be alive, it won’t be happened. honestly, he is not really dedicated for making apple more and more growing unlikely Steve. I don’t think that he feels any responsibility on company what Steve did. since Steve is gone, I don’t follow and care apple anymore. the company will turn itself as the second MS or something.
What if Wozman would take the charge as chairman of the board, would you change your mind?
You are joking, right?
Woz doesn’t have a CEO bone in his entire body.
Another bag of air from Edward Samsung. What a surprise that you stopped by to add your usual Apple bashing. Buy a clue, we “don’t follow and care” your opinion either.
Edward posts on behalf of Samsung. That’s all you need to know about what Edward does for a living. Sad really.
for not follow or caring about Apple since the death of SJ, you sure spend alot of time trolling and spreading FUD.
I hope Tim is a strong man, he needs to weather this assault on him and let these slings and arrows bounce off.
If Apple ousts Tim Cook, that will be the beginning of a long decline for the company. You can forget about Apple continuing to be the innovation leader.
Understand, this isn’t meant as a defense of Tim Cook. The problem wouldn’t be that he was gone, but why he was gone, and what that means in terms of who will replace him.
The new CEO will be charged with one primary task: bringing the stock price back up. That means doing what Wall Street wants, which for a company like Apple, is a horrible idea.
Where would Apple be today if Jobs had done what Wall Street wanted? Wall Street wanted Apple to convert itself into a manufacturer of commodity PCs. Wall Street thought the Apple retail stores were a horrible idea.
If your primary goal is pleasing Wall Street investors, you can’t take the long view of anything, because Wall Street people are the most shortsighted people on the planet.
So mark my words, if Tim Cook is ousted, he will be replaced by some visionless, finance-focused schlub, and Apple will rust.
——RM
Yup: Been there, done that.