Steve Jobs won't be able to run Apple forever. A lot of people believe Steve Jobs is personally responsible for Apple's success. When he steps down, can Apple continue to make such well designed products?
I think so yes and the main reason for this is for the team Steve Jobs has built to replace him.<p>First of all there is Tim Cook, who as you will recall when Steve Jobs took a leave of absense in 2009, Tim Cook was calling the shots and he handled the storm caused by this extremely well.<p>Furthermore, the main difference between Apple and many of its competitors aren't just its "awesome designs" but rather its supply chain and inventory something, which Tim Cook is in charge of and handles very well - especially as you can see by his salary bonus which was $60million.<p>Additionally, most smart companies plan years ahead for their development roadmaps - Apple is an extremely smart company and will already have a development roadmap outlined for a few years in advance meaning that, they're already secure for the short-term well, they probably have a working iPhone 8 and an iPad 5 right now.<p>However, intead of just focusing on Tim Cook there is also Jonathan Ive who can take over the role as "visionary" having worked in the design aspects of Apples Products AND there is Scott Forstall who can focus on the "software" aspect of the business.<p>Again this shows, that Steve Jobs has built a great team to take over the day-to-day running of Apple with Tim Cook in charge and Scott Forstall and Jonathan Ive supporting in the design/new products and software departments that Apple will have continued success even without Steve Jobs operating as CEO.
The fact that at the peak of Apple's success, a question about their survival is even meaningful points to the difficulties Apple faces going forward. The core problem Apple faces is not Steve Jobs leaving - though it doesn't help.<p>Despite the iPad (which lest we forget spent years in development and is basically an extension to the mature iPod product line) the past year has been full of lackluster product announcements - Mac apps, Beatles, Verizon, and Newscorp. Jobs didn't even show up for most of those and even the flagship announcement was marred by Antennagate.<p>The core problem is that their own mythology will make them increasingly risk adverse (if it hasn't already). Their $60 billion cash in hand presents them with some really tough choices - admit that their ideas are not good enough to spend that kind of money on and pay a dividend, hold the cash for a rainy day and signal pessimism about the company's future earnings, or make a big acquisition/merger of the sort that rarely plays out well in the initial press coverage.<p>Given the way in which Apple is perceived and the amount of cash in hand, it is difficult to spend a significant portion of that money in a way that does not have significant potential to be spun as a spectacular failure - and Apple has its share of failures, Ping being the most recent and AppleTV the most enduring. Other than purchasing Disney, there really isn't a good option for Apple and even that turns them into a company like GE. One might say that Apple faces an existential crisis and the question reflects that.