The Board That Fired Its Founder

Empire Decisions · Cupertino, 1985 & 1997 · Steve Jobs
TL;DR: In 1985 Apple's board sided with the professional CEO Steve Jobs had personally recruited, and stripped Jobs of all operating power. Twelve years later the company was ninety days from insolvency. The only option left was the founder it had exiled.

What actually happened

The 1985 showdown wasn't a coup from nowhere: Jobs had recruited John Sculley from Pepsi, then fought him over the Macintosh's price and direction until the board had to choose. They chose Sculley. Jobs left, founded NeXT, and bought a struggling graphics company called Pixar.

By 1997 Apple had burned through two more CEOs and most of its cash. It acquired NeXT for $429 million, nominally for its operating system, and got Jobs back with it. The 'interim' CEO then cut the product line from dozens to four, took Microsoft's $150 million investment on stage in Boston, and began the run that produced the iMac, iPod and iPhone.

The board that fired him had been right about one thing: Jobs in 1985 was unmanageable. The decade in exile is where he learned the discipline Apple bought back: NeXT's failure to sell hardware, Pixar's slow grind to Toy Story.

The play to remember

Exile teaches what success can't. The most valuable executive Apple ever had was forged by being fired from Apple.

Sources & fact flags: Walter Isaacson, Steve Jobs; Apple SEC filings; contemporaneous reporting on the 1997 NeXT acquisition.

New cases drop daily on TikTok and Instagram. The first 200 on the waitlist get 3 months free at launch.

Join the Vellum waitlist