Apple CEO Tim Cook wins 'Person of the Year' honor from London's Financial Times
For leading Apple to continued financial success, introducing buzzworthy new product categories, and putting morals over profits, Tim Cook has been named "Person of the Year" by economic-focused newspaper the Financial Times.
In revealing their pick, the London-based publication noted that shares of Apple are up 50 percent since the company's annual shareholder meeting in February. It was then that Cook warned investors to "get out of the stock" if they valued profit over issues such as human rights, renewable energy, or accessibility for people with special needs.
Thus far in 2014, Apple's value has increased by nearly as much as rival Google's entire market capitalization. And while Cook has overseen the unveilings of Apple Pay and the Apple Watch, he's also increased diversity in the company's executive ranks, improved transparency in his company's supply chain, reduced dependence on oil and non-renewable energy, lessened use of conflict minerals, and more.
Finally, Cook also took a personal stand for gay rights in October when he published an open letter disclosing that he is "proud to be gay." While Cook hadn't publicly spoken about his sexual orientation before that, he has openly championed equality during his tenure as chief executive at Apple.
In addition, the Financial Times also spotlighted Apple's increased share buybacks and dividends, which have returned more cash to investors. There was also the acquisition of Beats Electronics for $3 billion in May, and the blockbuster debuts of the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus in September.
While Cook was awarded person of the year by the finance-focused publication, the Apple CEO was a runner up in Time magazine's own award, losing out to "the Ebola fighters." Cook was one of eight finalists for Time's Person of the Year, alongside Alibaba CEO Jack Ma, Russian President Vladmir Putin, protesters in Ferguson, Mo., and pop star Taylor Swift.
In revealing their pick, the London-based publication noted that shares of Apple are up 50 percent since the company's annual shareholder meeting in February. It was then that Cook warned investors to "get out of the stock" if they valued profit over issues such as human rights, renewable energy, or accessibility for people with special needs.
Thus far in 2014, Apple's value has increased by nearly as much as rival Google's entire market capitalization. And while Cook has overseen the unveilings of Apple Pay and the Apple Watch, he's also increased diversity in the company's executive ranks, improved transparency in his company's supply chain, reduced dependence on oil and non-renewable energy, lessened use of conflict minerals, and more.
Finally, Cook also took a personal stand for gay rights in October when he published an open letter disclosing that he is "proud to be gay." While Cook hadn't publicly spoken about his sexual orientation before that, he has openly championed equality during his tenure as chief executive at Apple.
In addition, the Financial Times also spotlighted Apple's increased share buybacks and dividends, which have returned more cash to investors. There was also the acquisition of Beats Electronics for $3 billion in May, and the blockbuster debuts of the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus in September.
While Cook was awarded person of the year by the finance-focused publication, the Apple CEO was a runner up in Time magazine's own award, losing out to "the Ebola fighters." Cook was one of eight finalists for Time's Person of the Year, alongside Alibaba CEO Jack Ma, Russian President Vladmir Putin, protesters in Ferguson, Mo., and pop star Taylor Swift.
Comments
“Time didn’t give it to you? Well, Times did. See, that’s plural, so it’s better!”
That’s all I have, folks.
OK, I have to admit that's hilarious. ????
Well, it's about Time!...
Actually, although this forum seems pretty resentful about it,
I can't imagine Mr. Cook regrets losing the Time award to the sort of
selfless, cooperative, humane activities of the collective that did win it.
I'm just happy Cook didn't win the Time Magazine Person of the Year award. I was worried they might have given it to him for having enslaved more Chinese than Genghis Khan. "Whew!"
/s (for those that might be confused)
Also work out a corporate policy on the App Store. Stop reacting to publicity. Make and stick with a decision.
Agreed.
I'm as politically correct as the next european centrist but I'd prefer he had a better record with software releases. The hardware is doing fine.
Also work out a corporate policy on the App Store. Stop reacting to publicity. Make and stick with a decision.
I disagree with this. Take this latest one with Transmit. There were unwritten rules that conflicted with reality. It would be one thing if the SDK allowed what Apple suggested, but it didn't. In the end we are not all stuck with some bad decision. I'm quite sure Apple will continue to block apps that stay blocked. There have been things raised that didn't end in a change from Apple.
We can all agree that they should write down all of the unwritten rules and make them available to developers. That is the right thing to do so they can be challenged before someone's hard work is on the line.
I confess to having my initial doubts, but I have come around to the view that Cook is a truly remarkable CEO. He may not be the visionary that Jobs was -- very few people could be -- but he's an amazingly worthy successor to Jobs.
So basically the FT gave Cook an award for making Apple more PC.
What's 'PC' about what he's done? Has it come out of your hide?
I confess to having my initial doubts, but I have come around to the view that Cook is a truly remarkable CEO. He may not be the visionary that Jobs was -- very few people could be -- but he's an amazingly worthy successor to Jobs.
And then some. People here are still suspicious (gay, liberal, not Jobs), and and unhappy about him using his position for the greater good. Out there in the real world I don't think anybody is complaining.
Really, despite the fact that this gathering appears to be really angry about it, Great topic with amazing discussion. thanks for sharing.
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anantksundaram:
I confess to having my initial doubts, but I have come around to the view that Cook is a truly remarkable CEO. He may not be the visionary that Jobs was -- very few people could be -- but he's an amazingly worthy successor to Jobs.
I'll just say one thing. That's one amazingly good looking, buff guy, especially taking into account he was born in 1960...
An accolade from the FT is not an honour in my books. The FT is a regressive paper that knows nothing about technology.
They probably awarded it to Cook because he's good with numbers.
12/11/2014 01:40 PM
I confess to having my initial doubts, but I have come around to the view that Cook is a truly remarkable CEO. He may not be the visionary that Jobs was -- very few people could be -- but he's an amazingly worthy successor to Jobs.
Agree
Nobel Prize for Obama for being black, Person of the Year for Cook for being gay; straight, white men need not apply
What a comment...
Apparently, intelligence 'need not be applied'.
Very well deserved. As for the comments, the 1st 3 are good, and the remaining are utter shit.
Jake in Seoul 3 hours ago
Congratulations to Tim Cook and for the FT for (finally) recognizing his ability. Among his talents that apparently remain generally unrecognized in Europe and North America is his extraordinary finesse in dealing in effective ways with people and institutions across broad stretches of Asia.
In China he is a corporate rock star, likely the most popular Western businessman, featured in many hundreds of articles. He serves on the advisory board of the prestigious Tsinghua University School of Economics and Management (along with Jack Ma of Alibaba and Robin Li of Baidu), regularly meets with the government officials, including Li Ke-qiang and Miao Wei, has a Chinese sister-in-law, and feels comfortable visiting the shop floor and chatting amiably with assembly line workers. It is surely his understanding of, and appreciation for, China that has helped smooth Apple's huge market success there and overcome the numerous potential pitfalls any prominent U.S. company might have operating in China.
In Taiwan, Apple also has a massive presence, due a creative and durable partnership with Foxconn, Quanta, and many other suppliers. These are relationships that Tim Cook helped create and foster and they are the manufacturing fundament, through their extensions in mainland China, of Apple's success.
In Japan, perhaps the most loyally Apple country on earth, due especially to Steve Jobs' love affair with Japanese culture, this legacy has been maintained and strengthened under Tim Cook with a new Apple research center, announced just this week in Yokohama.
Finally, here in South Korea, Tim Cook has continued a vital relationship with LG Display and likely through a long-standing personal connection to Lee Jae-yong, the likely successor to leadership at Samsung, has begun to move beyond years of legal wrangling to a return to a productive partnership, supplying memory chips, and fabricating the next generation of mobile CPUs.
And the list goes on. . . . Forgive my prolixity, but having lived and worked off and on for decades in East Asia, I feel Tim Cook has never been fully recognized for his manifest ability to create and maintain great corporate partnerships in Asia, helping create products that millions of fans all over the region will gladly stand in line to acquire.
Tim Cook is a brilliant choice for Person of the Year and this is a fine writeup.
With all respect to Steve Jobs, Apple as a company can now go places that it could not have gone under Jobs' draconian -- and brilliant -- reign.
I don't care if Cook is not primarily a product guy. Apple will always be a product company. It is executing on its OS and product updates in a more thoughtful and disciplined way than I have ever seen. Even more astonishing are the pace and scale of improvements: these updates are going out to hundreds of millions of devices around the world.
It was a great move to put Sir Jony in charge of Human Interface (i.e. user interface rather than device design), which was only possible after Scott Forstall was excommunicated.