SYNOPSIS
Steve Jobs was born on February 24, 1955, to two University of Wisconsin graduate students who gave him up for adoption. Smart but directionless, Jobs experimented with different pursuits before starting Apple Computers with Steve Wozniak in 1976. Apple's revolutionary products, which include the iPod, iPhone and iPad, are now seen as dictating the evolution of modern technology.
Early Life
Steven Paul Jobs was born on February 24, 1955, to Joanne
Schieble (later Joanne Simpson) and Abdulfattah "John" Jandali, two
University of Wisconsin graduate students who gave their unnamed son up
for adoption. His father, Abdulfattah Jandali, was a Syrian political
science professor and his mother, Joanne Schieble, worked as a speech
therapist. Shortly after Steve was placed for adoption, his biological
parents married and had another child, Mona Simpson. It was not until Jobs was 27 that he was able to uncover information on his biological parents.
As an infant, Steven was adopted by Clara and Paul Jobs and named
Steven Paul Jobs. Clara worked as an accountant and Paul was a Coast
Guard veteran and machinist. The family lived in Mountain View within
California's Silicon Valley. As a boy, Jobs and his father would work
on electronics in the family garage. Paul would show his son how to
take apart and reconstruct electronics, a hobby which instilled
confidence, tenacity and mechanical prowess in young Jobs.
While Jobs has always been an intelligent and innovative thinker, his
youth was riddled with frustrations over formal schooling. A prankster
in elementary school, Jobs's fourth-grade teacher needed to bribe him to
study. Jobs tested so well, however, that administrators wanted to
skip him ahead to high school—a proposal that his parents declined.
Not long after Jobs did enroll at Homestead High School (1971), he was introduced to his future partner, Steve Wozniak, through a friend of Wozniak's. Wozniak was attending the University of Michigan at the time. In a 2007 interview with ABC News,
Wozniak spoke about why he and Jobs clicked so well: "We both loved
electronics and the way we used to hook up digital chips," Wozniak said.
"Very few people, especially back then had any idea what chips were,
how they worked and what they could do. I had designed many computers so
I was way ahead of him in electronics and computer design, but we still
had common interests. We both had pretty much sort of an independent
attitude about things in the world. ..."
After high school, Jobs enrolled at Reed College in Portland,
Oregon. Lacking direction, he dropped out of college after six months
and spent the next 18 months dropping in on creative classes. Jobs later
recounted how one course in calligraphy developed his love of
typography.
Apple Computers
After high school, Jobs enrolled at Reed College in Portland,
Oregon. Lacking direction, he dropped out of college after six months
and spent the next 18 months dropping in on creative classes. Jobs later
recounted how one course in calligraphy developed his love of
typography.
In 1974, Jobs took a position as a video game designer with Atari.Several months later he left Atari to find spiritual enlightenment in
India, traveling the continent and experimenting with psychedelic drugs.
In 1976, when Jobs was just 21, he and Wozniak started Apple Computers.
The duo started in the Jobs family garage,
and funded their entrepreneurial venture after Jobs sold his Volkswagen bus and Wozniak sold his beloved scientific calculator.
"On being the richest man in
an interview to The Wall Street
Journal in
1993 "Being the richest
man in the cemetery doesn't matter
to me...
Going to bed at night
saying we've done something wonderful
... that's
what matters to me"
Jobs and Wozniak are credited with revolutionizing the computer industry
by democratizing the technology and making the machines smaller,
cheaper, intuitive and accessible to everyday consumers. Wozniak
conceived a series of user-friendly personal computers, and—with Jobs in
charge of marketing—Apple initially marketed the computers for $666.66
each. The Apple I earned the corporation $774,000. Three years after the
release of Apple's second model, the Apple II, sales increased by 700
percent, to $139 million. In 1980, Apple Computer became a publically
traded company, with a market value of $1.2 billion on the very first
day of trading. Jobs looked to marketing expert John Scully of
Pepsi-Cola to help fill the role of Apple's president.
Departure from Apple
However, the next several products from Apple suffered
significant design flaws resulting in recalls and consumer
disappointment. IBM suddenly surpassed Apple sales, and Apple had to
compete with an IBM/PC dominated business world. In 1984, Apple
released the Macintosh, marketing the computer as a piece of a counter
culture lifestyle: romantic, youthful, creative. But despite positive
sales and performance superior to IBM's PCs, the Macintosh was still
not IBM compatible. Scully believed Jobs was hurting Apple, and
executives began to phase him out.
In 1985, Jobs resigned as Apple's CEO to begin a new hardware and
software company called NeXT, Inc. The following year Jobs purchased an
animation company from George Lucas,
which later became Pixar Animation Studios. Believing in Pixar's
potential, Jobs initially invested $50 million of his own money into
the company. Pixar Studios went on to produce wildly popular animation
films such as Toy Story, Finding Nemo and The Incredibles.
Pixar's films have netted $4 billion. The studio merged with Walt
Disney in 2006, making Steve Jobs Disney's largest shareholder.
Reinventing Apple
Despite Pixar's success, NeXT, Inc. floundered in its attempts to sell its specialized operating system to mainstream America. Apple eventually bought the company in 1997 for $429 million. That same year, Jobs returned to his post as Apple's CEO.
Much like Steve Jobs instigated Apple's success in the 1970s, he is
credited with revitalizing the company in the 1990s. With a new
management team, altered stock options and a self-imposed annual salary
of $1 a year, Jobs put Apple back on track. His ingenious products such
as the iMac, effective branding campaigns, and stylish designs caught
the attention of consumers once again.
Thank you for read my all friends
Pancreatic Cancer
In 2003, Jobs discovered that he had a neuroendocrine tumor, a
rare but operable form of pancreatic cancer. Instead of immediately
opting for surgery, Jobs chose to alter his pescovegetarian diet while
weighing Eastern treatment options. For nine months Jobs postponed
surgery, making Apple's board of directors nervous. Executives feared
that shareholders would pull their stocks if word got out that their
CEO was ill. But in the end,
Jobs's confidentiality took precedence over shareholder disclosure. In
2004, he had a successful surgery to remove the pancreatic tumor. True
to form, in subsequent years, Jobs disclosed little about his health.
Recent Innovations
Apple introduced such revolutionary products as the Macbook
Air, iPod and iPhone, all of which have dictated the evolution of
modern technology. Almost immediately after Apple releases a new
product, competitors scramble to produce comparable technologies. In
2007, Apple's quarterly reports were the company's most impressive
statistics to date. Stocks were worth a record-breaking $199.99 a share,
and the company boasted a staggering $1.58 billion dollar profit, an
$18 billion dollar surplus in the bank, and zero debt.
In 2008, iTunes became the second biggest music retailer in
America-second only to Wal-Mart. Half of Apple's current revenue comes
from iTunes and iPod sales, with 200 million iPods sold and six billion
songs downloaded. For these reasons, Apple has been rated No. 1 in
America's Most Admired Companies, and No. 1 amongst Fortune 500
companies for returns to shareholders.
Personal Life
Early in 2009, reports circulated about Jobs's weight loss,
some predicting his health issues had returned, which included a liver
transplant. Jobs had responded to these concerns by stating he was
dealing with a hormone imbalance. After nearly a year out of the
spotlight, Steve Jobs delivered a keynote address at an invite-only
Apple event September 9, 2009.
In respect to his personal life, Steve Jobs remained a private man
who rarely discloses information about his family. What is known is
Jobs fathered a daughter with girlfriend Chrisann Brennan when he was
23. Jobs denied paternity of his daughter Lisa in court documents,
claiming he was sterile. Jobs did not initiate a relationship with his
daughter until she was 7 but, when she was a teenager, she came to live
with her father.
In the early 1990s, Jobs met Laurene Powell at Stanford business
school, where Powell was an MBA student. They married on March 18,
1991, and lived together in Palo Alto, California, with their three
children.
Final Years
On October 5, 2011, Apple Inc. announced that co-founder Steve Jobs had died. He was 56 years old at the time of his death.Thank you for read my all friends
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