That’s according to a report Tuesday (Sept. 27) by Bloomberg News, citing sources with knowledge of conversations John Ternus has had internally with colleagues.
Among his ideas for Apple include depending less on the company’s traditional spring and fall product launches and cutting some middle-management roles to reduce the layers between engineers and senior executives, the sources told Bloomberg.
Ternus has also indicated that Apple must introduce products faster and become more experimental to stay competitive in the artificial intelligence (AI) era, the sources said, adding that there are already cost-reduction efforts happening.
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The report said that Ternus, who became Apple’s chief executive earlier this month, is also searching for new revenue streams and ways to earn more money from existing products, particularly amid slowing growth in the company’s services division.
Bloomberg noted that Apple has an extensive slate of products lined up for 2027. These include camera-equipped AirPods, its first smart glasses and a revamped iPhone to mark the 20th anniversary of the company’s flagship device.
With so many devices in the pipeline, Ternus is rethinking the company’s schedule of product announcements, which have for much of the last decade happened in the fall. Ternus wants Apple to roll out products throughout the year, though changing the company’s development practice could take years, employees told Bloomberg.
The report added that Ternus has also explored how AI could accelerate product development and perform tasks currently handled by human workers.
Apple during the summer worked on a plan to let go of around 5,000 AppleCare customer-service workers, including many who work from home, based on the notion that improved AI-powered phone and web agents could do parts of their job. But Apple eventually halted those plans and is not looking to take such measures, the report said.
Writing about Apple’s latest product rollout earlier this month, PYMNTS CEO Karen Webster discussed the AI-related problem facing the company, in that all of the products featured other firms’ artificial intelligence.
“AI is becoming a consumer utility, and consumer utilities live on smartphones, earbuds and kitchen counters. Apple has the best distribution in consumer technology to a user base that outspends Google’s,” Webster wrote. “Distribution without a product of your own means you’re a tollbooth for others to pass through. And toll collectors get regulated or disintermediated. The Steve Jobs comparison is about amazing products. The problem Ternus has is a platform problem.”
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