Apple is one of the most popular and powerful companies in the world. Not only that, it revolutionized how we communicate and more. Starting by creating computers, Apple surged to the forefront of the most important companies in hiဣstory with the creation of the iPod, the iPhone, and the iPad. All of this success stemmed from the mind of its co-founder, Steve Jobs.

On October 5, 2011, Steve Jobs passed away at the age of 56. He had just left the CEO post at Apple, the company he co-founded, and returned to for a second period as its head. Jobs was an 🐲entrepreneur through and through, and the story of his rise is the story of Apple as a company, aloཧng with some very interesting twists.

In this article, we'll look at the career of Steve Jobs and the company he founded, as well as some of the lessons Apple offers for potential entrepreneurs.

The fact that Apple was the first company to surpass the $1 trillion market capitalization mark, and later the $2 trillion and $3 trillion marks, is in no small part connected to the legacy and lessons learned from 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Steve Jobs.

From Blue Boxes to Apple

Steve Jobs 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:got his start in business with another Steve, Steve Wozniak,&nb🧔sp;building the blue boxes phone phreakers used to make free calls across the n✱ation.

The two were members of the HomeBrew Computer Club, where they quickly became enamored with kit computers and left the blue boxes behind. Founding Apple in 1976, the next product the two sold was the Apple I, which was a kit for building a PC. In order to do anything with it, the customer needed to add their own monitor and keyboard.

With Wozniak doing most of the building and Jobs handling the sales, the two made enough money off the hobbyist market to invest in the Apple II. It was the Apple II that made the company, which was incorporated in 1977. Jobs and Wozniak created enough interest in their new product to attract 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:venture capital. This meant they were i🦄n the big leagues and the company wo♏uld continue to grow.

The Roller Coaster Ride Begins

By 1979, Apple was making over $5 million in net income solely on the strength of the Apple II. The Apple II wasn't state of the art, but it did allow computer enthusiasts to create and sell their own programs. Among these user-generated programs was VisiCalc, a type of proto-Excel that represented the first software with business applications.

Although Apple did not profit directly from these programs, they did see more interest as the uses for the Apple II broadened. This model of allowing users to create their own programs and sell them would reappear in the 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:app market of the future b♛ut with a much tighter business strategy arouဣnd it.

By the time Apple 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:went public in 1980, the dynamic of the company was more or less set. Steve Jobs was the fiery visionary, with an intense and often combative management style, and Steve Wozniak was the quiet genius 💮who made the vision work.

Apple's 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:board of directors wasn't too fond of such a power imbalance in the company, however. Jobs and the board agreed to add John Sculley to the executive team in 1983. In 1985, the board ousted Jobs in favor of Sculley.

The Gap Years

Steve Jobs was rich and unemployed. Although he wasn't working at Apple, he was far from idle. During this time, from 1985 to 1996, Jobs was involved in two big deals; the first of which was an investment.

In 1986, Jobs purchased a controlling stake in a company called Pixar from George Lucas. The company was struggling, but its eventual success in digital animation led to an 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:initial public offering (IPO) that earned Jobs around $1 billion.

The second was a return to his old obsession with computers, founding NeXT to create high-end computers. These were expensive machines with an operating system representing the best attempt yet at making the power of UNIX fit into a graphical user interface. When 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Tim Berners-Lee created the World Wide Web, he did so using a NeXT machine.

Of these two deals, NeXT proved the most important, as it turned out Apple was looking to replace its operating system. Apple bought NeXT in 1996 for its operating system, bringing Steve Jobs back to the first company he founded.

Getting Apple Back on Track

When Jobs returned, the company wasn't in a good place. Apple had begun to flounder as cheap PCs running Windows flooded the market. Jobs found himself in the driver's seat again and took some drastic steps to turn around Apple's decline.

The company asked for and received a $150 million investment from Bill Gates. Jobs used the money to ramp up advertising and highlight the products Apple already offered while choking off 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:research and development (R&D) money in non-producing areas.

The NeXT operating system was used to create the iMac, Apple's first hit PC in a long time. Jobs followed this up with a list of successes from the iPod in 2001 to the iPhone in 2007, and the iPad in 2010.

The years between saw Apple dominate the smartphone market with the iPhone, open up an e-commerce store with iTunes, and launch 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:branded retail outlets called, what else, the Apple Store. When Jobs stepped down as CEO, Apple was scrapping with Exxon for the world's largest market cap.

The Bottom Line

It's impossible to sum up Jobs's career in a single article, but a few lessons stick out. First, innovation counts for a lot, but 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:innovative products fail without proper marketing. Second, there are no straight 🌳paths to success.

Jobs did get wealthy early on, but he would be a footnote today if he hadn't returned to Apple in the 90s. At one point, Jobs was kicked out of the company he helped create for being hard to work with. Rather than change, he bided his time, then took over again, and this time his attitude was seen as part of his genius.

There is much more to be learned from the life of Steve Jobs, as there is in the life of every 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:successful entrepreneur. The sheer hubris of the entrepreneurial spirit, the idea that you can do something bigger and better than it has ever been done before, always bears watching and studying, whether༒ to imitate or just to marvel at.