Steve Jobs stepped down as Apple’s CEO on Wednesday and Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook was named as his replacement. Jobs will remain with the company as chairman of the board.
> Following are some highlights and key events in Jobs’ career at Apple thus far.
1971 — Meets Steve Wozniak, with whom Jobs will later found Apple.
1975 — Starts attending meetings of the “Homebrew Computer Club,” for home computer enthusiasts.
1976 — Jobs and Wozniak raise US$1,750 and build their first marketable table-top computer, the Apple I.
1976 — Founds Apple Computer Company with Wozniak and Ronald Wayne. Wayne sells his stake two weeks later.
1976 — Jobs and Wozniak launch Apple I for $666.66, the first single-board computer with a video interface and an onboard Read Only Memory (ROM), which instructed the machine on how to load programs from an external source.
1977 — Apple is incorporated as Apple Computer Inc. and the new company buys out the original partnership.
1977 — Apple launches Apple II, the world’s first widely used personal computer.
1980 — Apple III launched.
1980 — Apple goes public, share price jumps from $22 to $29 on the first day of trading.
1981 — Jobs involves himself in Macintosh development.
1983 — Recruits John Sculley as Apple president and chief executive officer.
1983 — Announces “Lisa,” the first mouse-controlled computer. It fails in the marketplace.
1984 — Apple launches Macintosh with a splashy ad campaign on Super Bowl Sunday.
1985 — Jobs ousted from Apple after boardroom struggle with Sculley. Jobs resigns and takes five Apple employees with him.
1985 — Founds Next Inc. to develop computer hardware and software. Company later renamed Next Computer Inc.
1986 — Buys Pixar from George Lucas for less than $10 million. Company later renamed Pixar Animation Studios.
1989 — Next launches $6,500 NeXT Computer, also known as The Cube. It comes with a monochrome monitor, and fails in the marketplace.
1996 — Apple acquires Next Computer for $427 million; Jobs becomes advisor to Apple Chairman Gilbert F. Amelio.
1997 — Jobs becomes interim CEO and chairman of Apple Computer Inc. after Amelio is ousted. Jobs’ salary is $1.
1998 — Apple releases the all-in-one iMac, which sells millions of units, financially reviving the company and boosting its share price by 400 percent. IMac wins the Gold Award from British Design and Art Direction. Vogue calls it “one of Spring’s hottest fashion statements,” and Business Week says it is “one of the century’s lasting images.”
1998 — Apple returns to profitability and records four profitable quarters in a row.
2000 — ‘Interim’ dropped from Jobs’ title.
2001 — Apple makes first foray into consumer electronics with launch of iPod, the portable MP3 player. (It sells more than 4.4 million iPods in fiscal 2004.)
2003 — Jobs announces the iTunes Music Store, which sells encoded songs and albums.
2004 — In August, Jobs is diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and undergoes surgery. He recovers and returns to work in September.
2007 — Jobs announces the iPhone, one of the first smartphones without a keyboard, at Macworld Expo.
2008 — In late December Apple announces that Jobs will not deliver the keynote at the 2009 Macworld Expo or attend the event, sparking speculation about his health.
2009 — In early January Jobs says his dramatic weight loss was caused by a hormone imbalance. He says the condition would not hinder his abilities to function as CEO. Around a week later Jobs says he will take a leave of absence from Apple until June because his medical condition had changed. He does not disclose his ailment. COO Tim Cook will handle Apple’s day-to-day operations during Jobs’ recovery period. Apple says Jobs will be involved with major strategic decisions.
June 2009 — The Wall Street Journal reports that Jobs underwent a liver transplant. A Tennessee hospital later releases a statement confirming the operation.
June 2009 — Apple confirms that Jobs is returning to work at the end of the month.
January 2010 — Apple announces the iPad tablet computer, which becomes an instant success and spawns a new category of mobile computing devices.
September 2010 — Jobs appears on stage in San Francisco to announce Apple’s second-generation Apple TV set-top box, which streams movies from the Internet or mobile devices like the iPhone and iPad directly to TV sets.
January 2011 — Apple announces Jobs is taking a medical leave of absence, without specifying a reason for the leave or how long he’d be away. Questions are raised about the severity of Jobs’ health problems, and its impact on the company’s stock, product development and business operations.
March 2011 — Taking a break from his medical leave, Jobs makes an appearance at an event in San Francisco to introduce the iPad 2.
Slideshow: iPad 2’s top new features
June 2011 — While still on leave, Jobs appears at the Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco to introduce the iCloud and iOS 5. A few days later, Jobs appears in front of the Cupertino City Council with a proposal to build a spaceship-like campus in the city.
August 2011 — Jobs steps down as Apple’s CEO, saying he can “no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO.” Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook assumes the CEO title. Jobs remains at Apple as chairman of the board.