THE GOOD THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT STEVE JOBS

 

Steven Jobs

Steven Jobs, born in 1955, American computer executive, who cofounded Apple Inc., one of the first manufacturers of personal computers. Jobs went to high school in Los Altos, California, and attended lectures at Hewlett-Packard Co. in Palo Alto after school. He attracted the attention of the company president and was hired as a summer employee. He worked there with Stephen Wozniak, an electronics inventor. In 1972 Jobs graduated from high school and entered Reed College, but he dropped out after one semester. He joined Atari in 1974 as a designer of video games. After several months he quit his job and made a trip to India in search of spiritual enlightenment.

Upon his return to California, Jobs found that Wozniak, who still worked for Hewlett-Packard, had become involved with a group of young electronics enthusiasts in a computer club. Jobs, who was interested in marketing, persuaded Wozniak to work with him. Together they designed and built a prototype of the Apple I, a preassembled computer circuit board, in Jobs’s parents’ garage. A local electronics equipment retailer ordered 25 of the machines, and Wozniak quit his job to become the vice president in charge of research and development of the new venture. They formed the Apple Computer Company in April 1976.

The Apple I was offered at a price of $666.66 and sold 600 units, chiefly to hobbyists and electronics enthusiasts. The Apple II followed shortly, keeping the simplicity and compactness of the Apple I, but more suited to the general user. Apple Computer was incorporated in 1977 and became phenomenally successful.

In 1983 Apple introduced the Lisa, a personal computer primarily designed for business use that incorporated a handheld “mouse” to select commands and control an on-screen cursor. The Lisa was followed by the Macintosh personal computer, aimed at the general user to provide easy and affordable access to information and computing power.

Throughout the early 1980s Jobs led the company as it developed and sold personal computers, software, and printers throughout the world. In 1985 poor sales and internal problems at Apple led to restructuring and to Jobs’s forced resignation from the company. He took five Apple employees with him and started a new computer company, NeXT, Inc. Jobs acquired capital from sources such as financier H. Ross Perot; Canon, Inc.; Stanford University; and Carnegie Mellon University. His new computers were innovative but expensive. When NeXT computers sold poorly, Jobs shut down the company’s hardware division to focus on creating software.

In 1986 Jobs purchased the computer division of motion-picture studio Lucasfilm Ltd. for $60 million, incorporating the division as Pixar Animation Studios. Pixar became a leader in computer animation and in developing software for advanced computer graphics. In 1995 Pixar completed Toy Story, the first fully computer-generated feature film. In 1996 Apple, seeking a foundation for its new operating system, bought NeXT for $400 million and made Jobs a consultant to the company he had founded. In July 1997 the executive board of Apple ousted its chief executive officer (CEO), Gilbert Amelio.

Jobs quickly took a series of aggressive steps designed to boost consumer confidence in Apple, reverse its falling share of the personal computer market, and restore profitability. In September 1997 Apple convinced Jobs to become interim CEO of the company. By early 1998 Apple began making profits under his leadership. Jobs played a key role in the creation and marketing of a stylish, one-piece computer called the iMac, which debuted in mid-1998 and boosted Apple’s share of the personal computer market. In 2000 Jobs agreed to drop the word interim from his title and resume the role of permanent CEO. The next year the company introduced the iPod digital music player, which soon became one of the most popular devices ever sold by Apple.

In 2006 Jobs reached an agreement with The Walt Disney Company for Disney to acquire Pixar. The estimated $7.4-billion stock buyout plan made Jobs a director of Disney and added vastly to his already considerable fortune as Disney’s single largest shareholder.

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