Cook reflects on 15 years as Apple CEO: Saving lives with Apple Watch is his greatest pride, while Apple Maps is his biggest failure

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According to Bloomberg, outgoing Apple CEO Tim Cook admitted during an all-hands meeting with his successor John Ternus that the 2012 launch of Apple Maps was the "first major mistake" of his tenure, leading to the dismissal of the software chief; meanwhile, he cited the health features of the Apple Watch as his proudest achievement. (Previous coverage: Cook's 15-year report card: Apple's market cap grew 10x, profits surged 699%, and 540 stores opened worldwide) (Background: Cook announces departure as Apple CEO, John Ternus confirmed as successor) At Apple's Steve Jobs Theater, Cook stood beside his successor Ternus, facing all employees, and spoke about a list of mistakes he described as "staggeringly long." The backdrop for this all-hands meeting was Apple's recent announcement that the CEO transition will be completed on September 1: after 15 years in office, Cook will officially hand the baton to hardware engineering chief Ternus. Bloomberg reported the details of this conversation. Cook stated that replacing Google Maps on the iPhone with Apple's own Apple Maps in 2012 was the "first real major mistake" he made after taking over as CEO. How disastrous was the result? The navigation was riddled with errors: directions were off, landmark names were misplaced, and the overall experience was far inferior to Google's version. Cook admitted: "The product wasn't ready. We thought it was, because we were testing it locally." The aftermath of the Maps incident led to the first major executive shakeup of Cook's tenure: the firing of software chief Scott Forstall. Forstall was a close collaborator from the Steve Jobs era, and his departure signaled that Apple had officially entered the management structure of the post-Jobs era. Cook's handling of the situation at the time is worth noting: he issued a public apology and proactively told users to download other map apps. "We apologized and said: go use those apps, they are better than ours. That was a big pill of humility to swallow." Today, Cook's assessment is: "We now have the best map app in the world. We learned what it means to persevere, and we made the right decisions after making a mistake." Cook said there were "too many proud moments" over the past 15 years, but the health features of the Apple Watch stood out. When the Apple Watch debuted in 2014, its core health feature was only heart rate monitoring; since then, features such as blood oxygen detection, ECG, and hypertension detection have been added. Cook recalled his reaction to receiving the first-ever user letter saying "the watch saved my life": "It was a user telling me the watch saved his life. Of course, I receive these letters every day now, but the first one had the deepest impact on me and made me stop in my tracks." When Cook took over Apple in August 2011, the company's market cap was approximately $350 billion; today, Apple has surpassed $4 trillion, an increase of more than tenfold. During this time, he drove the expansion of large and small iPad models, more iPhone models, AirPods, and a comprehensive expansion of online services. Cook admitted that the list of mistakes is "staggeringly long," but under his leadership, Apple has largely avoided the large-scale recalls and shipment cancellations common among other consumer electronics companies. In addition to the Maps incident, two other bets that didn't reach the finish line were: the wireless charging mat AirPower, which was canceled before its official launch, and a decade-long autonomous car development project that ultimately fizzled out. However, Bloomberg noted that neither evolved into a crisis that shook the company's foundation. At the all-hands meeting, successor Ternus also previewed the upcoming product roadmap, declaring that Apple will "change the world" once again. Cook said he is in good health and plans to remain for the long term after transitioning to Executive Chairman. From the Maps disaster to the watch saving lives, the longest-serving Apple CEO left behind, in his farewell speech, more of a playbook on how to take responsibility for mistakes and then persevere.

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