Tim Cook bets his legacy on augmented reality
New York CNN —
When Tim Cook took over as Apple CEO from Steve Jobs nearly 12 years ago, some thought the company was already at its peak.
Under Cook, however, Apple’s market cap has surged by more than 700% to nearly $3 trillion. Its iPhone business has continued to be a juggernaut, fueled by new features and pricing strategies under his watch. And Apple has built up a robust services business, including paid music, TV and gaming products, giving the company a steady revenue stream not beholden to the cyclical nature of hardware sales.
But missing from Cook’s tenure at Apple has been the kind of massive, exciting product innovation seen during the Jobs years that could change how people interact with technology. Until now.
Last week, Apple introduced the Vision Pro, a mixed reality headset that the company says will usher in a new era of “spatial computing.” The headset blends both virtual reality and augmented reality, a technology that overlays virtual images on live video of the real world. It’s Apple’s biggest, and riskiest, product launch in years.
Cook has for years extolled the promise of augmented reality, touting its potential to help people communicate and collaborate with each other. At its event last week, Cook called the headset a “revolutionary product” and “the first product you look through, not at.”
But Cook is also better known as an operations mastermind than a product visionary. The two biggest product launches under Cook prior to the Vision Pro were the Apple Watch in 2015 and AirPods the following year. Those products proved to be successful moneymakers, but they didn’t exactly create a new paradigm for the company or the industry in the way the iPhone did under Jobs.
The Vision Pro, which goes on sale early next year, could end up being the product that defines Cook’s legacy, whether it fails or succeeds. And its success is anything but guaranteed.
Virtual and augmented reality remains a nascent market with little mainstream consumer adoption. Apple plans to charge a hefty $3,499 for its headset, which currently has limited apps and experiences, and requires users to stay tethered to a battery pack the size of an iPhone. And that’s saying nothing of the challenges of convincing users to regularly wear a computer on their faces.
“The world of the headset is a real challenge … it’s proven to be a challenge to create a mass market for that,” said Margaret O’Mara, tech historian and professor at the University of Washington. “The iPhone came about after many years of companies, Apple and others, trying to create a kind of supercomputer in your pocket, there was a long history of attempts. And it came on the market when a lot of people already had some sort of cellphone.”
Apple CEO Tim Cook poses for a portrait at Apple's global headquarters in Cupertino, California in 2016. Andrew Burton/The Washington Post/Getty Images From left, then-Apple COO Tim Cook, Apple CEO Steve Jobs and Phil Schiller, executive vice president for product marketing, answer questions after Jobs introduced new versions of the iMac and the iLife software applications at Apple's headquarters in Cupertino, California, in 2007. David Paul Morris/Getty Images Cook speaks in front of an image of an iPhone 4S at Apple headquarters in 2011. Reuters/Alamy Photographers use iPhones to take photos of Cook during a break in a Senate hearing held by the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Investigations in 2013. Cook and other Apple officials were on hand to explain the company's filings after the subcommittee accused Apple of tax avoidance. Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call/AP Cook, holding an iPhone 6 Plus and wearing an Apple Watch, discusses the new products during an event in Cupertino in September 2014. Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP Cook greets the crowd with U2 singer Bono as U2 guitarist The Edge looks on during an Apple special event at the Flint Center for the Performing Arts in Cupertino in September 2014. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Cook takes a photo with an Apple employee during the launch of the iPhone 6 at an Apple store in Palo Alto, California, in September 2014. Tony Avelar/AP Cook opens the door to an Apple Store in Palo Alto to begin sales of the new iPhone 6 in September 2014. Hundreds of people lined up to purchase the new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus that went on sale that day. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Cook stands in front of a MacBook display after an Apple special event in San Francisco in March 2015. Stephen Lam/Getty Images Cook takes a photo with his iPhone while addressing graduates during George Washington University's commencement exercises on the National Mall in May 2015. The university awarded Cook with an honorary doctorate of public service. Alex Brandon/AP Cook appears as a guest on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" in September 2015. Jeffrey R. Staab/CBS/Getty Images Cook is greeted by Pope Francis at the Vatican in January 2016. Serviziofotograficoor/Cpp/Shutterstock Cook shows an iPhone 7 to performer Maddie Ziegler during an event to announce new products in San Francisco in September 2016. Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP Cook speaks during the launch of Apple's AirPods in September 2016. Monica Davey/EPA/Shutterstock Cook is with James Corden and Pharrell during a taped comedy bit shown on a projection screen during an Apple event in San Francisco in September 2016. Beck Diefenbach/Reuters Cook spends time with students at Woodberry Down Community Primary School in London in February 2017. Cook was visiting to see how the school had incorporated Apple's iPad and related software in its curriculum. Yui Mok/PA Images/Getty Images Tim Cook puts on a Boston Red Sox jersey before a baseball game between the Red Sox and the Detroit Tigers in June 2017. Billie Weiss/Boston Red Sox/Getty Images President Donald Trump listens as Cook speaks during an American Technology Council roundtable at the White House in June 2017. Alex Brandon/AP Cook speaks during an Apple special event at the Steve Jobs Theatre on the Apple Park campus in September 2017. Apple held its first special event at the company's new Apple Park campus in Cupertino and unveiled a new iPhone. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Cook and Apple chief design officer Jonathan Ive look at the new Apple iPhone X during an Apple special event in September 2017. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Tim Cook signs the box of a new iPhone X at an Apple Store in Palo Alto in November 2017. The highly anticipated iPhone X went on sale around the world that day. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Cook and Oprah Winfrey hug during an Apple special event in Cupertino in March 2019. Stephen Lam/Reuters Cook welcomes customers to the opening of a new Apple Store at the historic Carnegie Library building in Washington, DC, in May 2019. The location represented Apple's most extensive restoration project to date, renovating what was once the city's Central Public Library. Win McNamee/Getty Images Cook speaks about the new iPhone Pro during an event in Cupertino in September 2019. David Paul Morris/Bloomberg/Getty Images Cook speaks with Singapore Paralympian Theresa Goh about the Apple watch she uses for training in December 2019. Edgar Su/Reuters Cook is seen on a laptop as he speaks during the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference in June 2020. The conference was held remotely because of the coronavirus pandemic. Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg/Getty Images Cook speaks via video conference at a House Judiciary subcommittee hearing on online platforms and market power in July 2020. Graeme Jennings/Pool/Getty Images Cook leaves a federal building in Oakland, California, in May 2021 after testifying in a federal lawsuit brought by Epic Games. Epic, the maker of the video game Fortnite, charged that Apple has transformed its App Store into an illegal monopoly. Noah Berger/AP Cook reacts after seeing a Macintosh SE computer held by Sajid Moinuddin, a fan of Apple products, during the inauguration of India's first Apple retail store in Mumbai in April 2023. Francis Mascarenhas/Reuters Cook speaks under an image of Vision Pro, a new mixed reality headset that the company unveiled in June 2023. Brooks Kraft/Apple Inc. In pictures: Apple CEO Tim Cook Prev Next
Followers of the company are divided on what the headset could ultimately mean for Cook. It’s never wise to bet against Apple when it comes to hardware, but even if the company succeeds, it’s probably not going to give Cook and Apple an iPhone-level success story, some say.
“It’s extremely unlikely to come out with anything even close to the [success of] the iPhone,” said Mike Bailey, director of research at FBB Capital Partners. “The last two opportunities — the watch was nice, the AirPods were nice, and this is probably the third thing that’s just nice. There’s a track record now where it’s extremely difficult to show any type of massive growth that even compares to the iPhone.”
But Tim Bajarin, a longtime Apple analyst and president at consumer tech research firm Creative Strategies, suggests the product shows Apple’s and Cook’s track record of innovation. “What Apple has done [with Vision Pro] is reinvent the personal computer,” he said. “We just saw the future of computing.”
“I think from Tim’s standpoint, he goes at this with a mentality that says: when they come to me saying, ‘It can’t be done,’ let’s make it happen,” Bajarin said.
Bajarin added that the Vision Pro reflects Cook’s work to grow and improve Apple’s ecosystem during his time as CEO. The headset likely wouldn’t be possible without the small, powerful chips made in-house during his tenure. Apple’s services bundle also makes clearer to consumers some of the ways in which they’ll be able to use the device — for things like meditation or watching movies — even before the company’s army of third-party developers build out additional experiences for the device, he said.
By that argument, the headset could serve as a capstone for years of product initiatives under Cook, and for his long tenure at the company.
Cook’s legacy is already defined as someone who successfully created market value. With the headset, he has the chance to also be known as someone who presided over the creation of an earth-shaking new product. That would truly put him in league with Jobs.
Source: CNN
