--- title: John Ternus Is Apple's Next CEO, the First Engineer to Run the Company Since Steve Jobs description: Tim Cook steps down on 1 September 2026 after 15 years. Apple named SVP of hardware engineering John Ternus as the next CEO, passing over its operations chain. author: Darie Nani (Editor-in-Chief) date: 2026-04-21T13:37:45.402Z updated: 2026-04-21T13:37:45.416Z canonical: https://www.sovereignmagazine.com/article/john-ternus-apple-next-ceo-first-engineer-since-steve-jobs image: https://cdn.nanimediahouse.com/cook-ternus-succession.webp categories: Business content_type: News region: Global publication: Sovereign Magazine about: - type: Organization name: Apple --- Tim Cook is stepping down as CEO of Apple on 1 September 2026, the company [announced on Monday](https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2026/04/tim-cook-to-become-apple-executive-chairman-john-ternus-to-become-apple-ceo/). He becomes executive chairman of the board. His replacement is John Ternus, the 50-year-old senior vice president of hardware engineering, who has worked at Apple since 2001 and has never held a commercial, finance or operations role. Ternus is the first engineer to run Apple since Steve Jobs. The board vote was unanimous. ## Apple passed over its chief operating officer For most of the last decade, the presumed successor was Jeff Williams. He was Cook's chief operating officer, ran Apple Watch, and spent 27 years inside the company. Williams retired in November 2025 and was replaced as COO by Sabih Khan. With Williams gone, the succession question reopened. The board did not promote Khan or any other operations executive. It reached into hardware engineering. That is a choice about what Apple thinks the next decade requires. Cook's 15 years were built on supply chain discipline, margin expansion and operational scale. Ternus's career has been spent on physical products: he led iPad, AirPods, iPhone hardware from 2020, and Apple Watch hardware from late 2022. Picking him over an operator is Apple stating, on the record, which of those two skill sets is the scarcer one now. ## Ternus's background is mechanical engineering, not business Ternus has a bachelor's in mechanical engineering from the University of Pennsylvania, class of 1997. His senior project was a feeding arm for people with quadriplegia that could be operated with head movements. He spent four years building virtual reality headsets at Virtual Research Systems before joining Apple's product design team in 2001, starting on the Apple Cinema Display. He was made VP of hardware engineering in 2013 under Dan Riccio and took over as senior VP in 2021 when Riccio moved on. He has driven the introduction of a recycled aluminium alloy used across multiple product lines, the 3D-printed titanium case of Apple Watch Ultra 3, and a set of repairability changes that have extended the service life of Apple products. He has no public profile as a manager of salespeople or a reader of P&Ls. He is a product and materials engineer who has been promoted each time the company needed one. ## The AI context is the context Apple is the [least impressive of the large-cap AI companies](https://www.sovereignmagazine.com/article/apple-reaches-lowest-nasdaq-correlation-in-20-years-as-ai-spending-unnerves-investors). Apple Intelligence, pitched at WWDC 2024, shipped late and thin. Siri has been rebuilt more than once and still trails what Google and OpenAI ship in assistants. Earlier this year Apple licensed Google's Gemini to power parts of Siri, an admission in the form of a contract. The company's strongest AI story is silicon: the Neural Engine in the A and M series, designed by Johny Srouji's chip team, sits under nearly every on-device AI feature the company ships. Srouji is taking over as chief hardware officer as Ternus moves up. Between Ternus at the top and Srouji running hardware, the two most senior operational roles at Apple will be held by engineers whose careers have been spent on devices and silicon. That is the bet: that Apple's AI position will be recovered through the [hardware stack](https://www.sovereignmagazine.com/article/apple-s-600-billion-manufacturing-investment-sparks-industrial-automation-boom-in-u-s-semicon), not through a consumer chatbot product. ## Cook stays on through the summer Cook, 65, has been CEO since 24 August 2011, when he took over from Steve Jobs six weeks before Jobs died. Under Cook, Apple grew from roughly a $350 billion company to above $3.5 trillion. He will remain CEO through the summer, work directly with Ternus on the handover, and then move into the executive chairman role, replacing Arthur Levinson. Cook appeared on Good Morning America last month and dismissed retirement speculation as rumour. The timing caught Wall Street off guard: Wedbush analyst Dan Ives had publicly expected him to stay at least another year. The announcement memos, released internally and then to press, were characteristically orderly. A transition date five months out. A named successor. A pre-agreed chairman role. Cook's last act as CEO is indistinguishable from his first fifteen years of them. ## FAQ **Q: Who is John Ternus?** John Ternus is Apple's senior vice president of hardware engineering and, from 1 September 2026, its chief executive officer. He is 50 years old, holds a bachelor's in mechanical engineering from the University of Pennsylvania, and joined Apple in 2001. He has led hardware development on iPad, AirPods, iPhone, Mac and Apple Watch, and was promoted to SVP of hardware engineering in 2021. **Q: How much was Apple worth when Tim Cook took over?** Apple was worth roughly $350 billion when Tim Cook became CEO on 24 August 2011. Under his leadership it grew to above $3.5 trillion in market capitalisation, a roughly tenfold increase. The growth was driven by iPhone, Services (App Store, iCloud, Apple Music), Apple Watch, AirPods and a large share-buyback programme. **Q: Who is Sabih Khan at Apple?** Sabih Khan is Apple's chief operating officer. He took over the role in November 2025 when Jeff Williams retired after 27 years at the company. Khan joined Apple in 1995 and has spent most of his career in operations and supply chain. He is responsible for Apple's global supply chain, manufacturing, service and support, and procurement. **Q: Why are so many Apple executives leaving in 2025 and 2026?** Several long-serving Apple executives have retired or moved on in the last twelve months, including chief operating officer Jeff Williams in November 2025 and, now, Tim Cook as CEO. Apple has framed these as planned, long-dated retirements from executives in their sixties who joined in the 1990s or early 2000s. The common factor is length of service: the generation of leaders who joined Apple under Steve Jobs is stepping back, and a younger cohort, led by John Ternus and Johny Srouji, is taking over.