Apple names John Ternus as next CEO starting September 1

Tim Cook will hand off the Apple CEO role to John Ternus, the company’s senior vice president of hardware engineering (the division responsible for physical product development), effective September 1. The transition marks the end of Cook’s 15 years as CEO. Ternus, 51, has worked at Apple for nearly 25 years, having joined the company’s product design team in 2001 as only his second job out of college. His first employer was Virtual Research Systems. Ternus rose through the ranks of hardware engineering, becoming a vice president in 2013 and earning a promotion to senior vice president in 2021.

Ternus is known for his intense attention to detail, a trait exemplified by his early work at the company. “At some point in my first year, I found myself at a supplier facility. I was far away from home. Well past midnight, I was using a magnifying glass to count the number of grooves on the head of a screw … and I was arguing with the supplier because these parts had 35 grooves. They were supposed to have 25,” said John Ternus, the incoming Apple CEO. He recalled this experience during a 2024 commencement speech at his alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania. As his responsibilities grew, Ternus oversaw hardware development across the Apple ecosystem, including the transition from Intel chips to Apple silicon (Apple’s proprietary chip architecture). He also led development on the Vision Pro (Apple’s spatial computing headset) and the MacBook Neo (Apple’s new, more affordable laptop model). To build the MacBook Neo, Ternus explained that Apple had to build the device from the ground up, leveraging both Apple silicon and the company’s long-standing expertise in building Macs, phones, and iPads to maintain product quality.

As CEO, Ternus will navigate Apple’s artificial intelligence strategy and hardware evolution. Despite his high-ranking role, Ternus has maintained a low public profile. Public records of political donations show that he donated $2,900 to US Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) in 2021. His low-profile approach is reflected in his philosophy on leadership. In his 2024 commencement speech, he advised graduates to always assume they are as smart as anyone else in the room, but never to assume they know as much as others, noting that this mindset provides the confidence to push forward and the humility to ask questions.

Why it matters

After 15 years of Tim Cook’s leadership, this transition marks a significant shift for Apple as it navigates the AI race and hardware evolution under a long-time internal leader.