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“I love Apple, consider it a lifelong privilege to have worked here for nearly 14 years, and I am very excited about this new role.” This is the way Tim Cook opened the iPhone 4S event In October 2011, his first product called… CEO of Apple.
Fifteen years later, we are on the cusp of another historic event for Apple to select the head of one of the world’s most famous and valuable companies. this Worldwide Developers Conference will Be the last cook Before handing over the reins to him Incoming CEO John Ternos In September, probably just before that month iPhone event.
There’s really no evidence of a change in leadership at the company, with Cook taking over from Steve Jobs as his struggle with pancreatic cancer took a turn for the worse. This makes this moment uncharted territory.
WWDCApple’s annual Software Developers Conference has hosted many exciting product launches over the years, from the first iOS to Apple Silicon and Apple Intelligence. It is a moment of welcome, not a moment of farewell – but this moment will be different. When Cook takes the stage, he will conclude a hugely successful era in Apple’s history — one that has seen it become a trillion-dollar company, multiple times over.
“WWDC 2026 is much more important than a regular developer conference,” said Paolo Pescatore, an analyst at PP Foresight. “Since this is Tim Cook’s final Worldwide Developers Conference as Apple CEO, it represents a symbolic handover moment as much as a software showcase.”
It’s unclear whether or not Ternus will take the stage WWDC Or delay his public appearance as CEO until the rumored iPhone event in September. Ternus has a background in hardware Rather than software, so WWDC is not its normal environment, although it did present Apple Silicon at the virtual event during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. That doesn’t mean he won’t appear on stage with Cook to publicly pass the baton.
Apple’s new CEO John Ternus has appeared at WWDC previously, despite his hardware experience.
Ben Wood, senior analyst at CCS Insight, said Ternus arrives at an important time for the company. “If the rumors are to be believed, there are a slew of new products to be announced over the next 12 months, which will give him an opportunity to start his tenure strong.”
As for the signs Cook will make regarding his departure, he may be downplaying their significance rather than wanting to prolong his final arc. “I expect he will want as little fanfare as possible, but will focus on some of the key accomplishments Apple has achieved under his leadership,” Wood said.
He’s also unlikely to want to draw too much focus from WWDC’s announcements, which will include updates to Apple’s operating systems, including iOS, MacOS, WatchOS and iPadOS, but will also include an expected refresh. Siri renewal.
Get my walk across the finish line
In many ways, Siri is the central theme of Cook’s leadership.
Apple launched the voice assistant In October 2011, just months after Cook took over as CEO. Its arrival raised skepticism, and the technology fell short of people’s sci-fi ideas of an intuitive PDA. Despite the initial hype, Siri didn’t work well. That was three years before Amazon first launched Alexa, and Apple never caught up.
This is partly because Apple has prioritized privacy and security for Siri, limiting the assistant’s features compared to Alexa. But what Siri was also missing at the time, and has been missing ever since, is the kind of thinking and linguistic skills that only advances in artificial intelligence and the development of large language models a decade later could provide.
So, it seems that when Apple announced Apple Intelligence and its integration with Siri at WWDC 2024, the voice assistant was about to finally deliver on its original promise. But nearly two years later, after delay after delay, the revamped Siri still hasn’t seen the light of day. Last month Apple He agreed to pay $250 million to settle several legal complaints alleging that it misled people about the iPhone’s capabilities.
The revamped Siri has been plagued by lag.
All signs point to this WWDC being the moment for Siri we’ve been waiting for all these years. If anything, Cook’s retirement all but confirms that.
Siri is his baby (even if Jobs was the one who originally acquired the technology), and Cook doesn’t seem like the type to abandon a project at the last moments before it’s completed. It would be quite surprising if he didn’t see that. It will be an integral part of several upcoming products that the company is rumored to have in the pipeline, e.g AirPods with cameras Or a Robotic iPad for your home.
Instead, it seems more likely that he will send advanced Siri out into the world to live his best life as a fully realized AI assistant and then retire peacefully to live his best life outdoors, filled with books and very little phone time.
It will be interesting to see how this chapter wraps up on stage. CNET staff will be in person at the event live from Apple Park, so be sure to follow all of our WWDC coverage on Monday.
