39 photos that show how Steve Jobs saved Apple from disaster and set it on the path to a $1 trillion valuation (AAPL)

This week, Apple officially hit the $1 trillion mark — making it the first American company to do so, ever. 

So much of that success is due to the vision of Steve Jobs, the late Apple cofounder. Without him, Apple as we know it today might not even exist.

Once upon a time, Apple was a disaster, chewing through CEOs and delivering one bad quarter of financial results after another.

In 1996, knowing he had to do something dramatic, then-Apple CEO Gil Amelio negotiated a deal to buy NeXT, the computer startup operated by an exiled Jobs, in hopes that he would bring some much-needed direction to the company.

Instead, Jobs staged a boardroom coup that resulted in Amelio’s resignation. Jobs had decided that if Apple were to be saved, he would be the one to do it — even if it meant getting help from the company’s rivals at Microsoft.

Here's what happened next.

SEE ALSO: 32 photos of Apple's early days before it ruled the world

In late 1996, Apple announced plans to bring cofounder Steve Jobs back into the fold 11 years after he left the company by acquiring his startup NeXT for $429 million — just in time for Jobs to join then-Apple CEO Gil Amelio on stage at January 1997's Macworld Expo, a convention for Mac enthusiasts, as a keynote speaker.

Steve Jobs' NeXT found its niche selling graphically intensive PCs with cutting-edge screens to universities and banks. Apple hoped that Jobs would revitalize the Mac maker, whose stock had hit a 12-year low under Amelio's leadership and experienced crippling losses.

On July 4, 1997, Jobs persuaded Apple's board to oust Amelio and make Jobs the interim, and then permanent, CEO. In August 1997, Jobs took the stage at another Macworld Expo to announce that Apple had taken a $150 million investment from its long-time rivals at Microsoft. "We need all the help we can get," Jobs said, to boos from the audience.

See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Contributer : Tech Insider https://ift.tt/2O93IET

Something that you might miss to see?