Source: Cailian
Mark Gurman, a well-known Apple explorer, said in a recent paper that Apple is preparing to expand the scope of most of its executives in response to the company's long-time chief operating officer Jeff Williams' imminent departure.
Williams has served as Apple COO since 2015 and is scheduled to retire officially at the end of this year. He is responsible for Apple's entire supply chain and operations, from manufacturing, parts procurement to technical support, and his importance to the company is self-evident.
Since announcing his retirement plan in July this year, Williams has successively handed over the management rights of supply chain, operations, and AppleCare customer support to the new chief operating officer Sabih Khan.
Citing people familiar with the matter, Gurman said that Eddy Cue, head of the services department, will take over the company's health and fitness team, and Craig Federighi, head of the software engineering department, will be responsible for the development of the Apple Watch operating system.
These executives have been with Apple for decades, their influence continues to rise, and they have been involved in promoting the birth of several blockbuster products.
Gurman mentioned that Apple’s decision to divide the health business into Qui’s management is at the time of the company’s upcoming launch of a new subscription service, “Health+,” which aims to integrate the health and fitness business into the same structure.
Sumbul Desai, head of the health department, and Jay Blahnik, head of the fitness department, were originally directly affiliated to Williams. According to the new structure, the two teams will be merged and managed by Desai, with Kuy becoming his immediate superior.
Desai is currently responsible for the development of health apps and other health products, as well as medical research and clinical validation. This business scope will be managed by Kuy in the future. Cue is currently in charge of Apple's TV + and music streaming, iCloud, maps and other online services.
Incorporating the health and fitness business into Kuy's service department highlights Apple's ambition to turn health and fitness into a major source of revenue.
Federigi, who has appeared at Apple conferences many times and is deeply loved by fruit fans, will now be in charge of the watchOS system. This is his second expansion this year. He has previously taken over the management of Siri's voice assistant and Vision Pro's head-mounted operating system visionOS.
Apple hardware chief John Ternus will also receive more authority and take full responsibility for Apple Watch hardware engineering. Although he was originally the "top leader" of the team, Williams has been personally supervising the research and development of new watches.
Ternus is widely regarded as a potential successor to Tim Cook. Cook has been in charge of Apple since 2011 and will be 65 next year; while Ternus, aged just 50, is one of the youngest members of Apple’s executive team and has had a larger voice in product planning in recent months.
Williams was also in charge of Apple's hardware and software design team. The company has previously announced that the two design departments, led by Molly Anderson and Alan Dye, will become Cook's direct departments after Williams leaves.
The company is looking for a successor to AI chief John Giannandrea, and environment and government affairs chief Lisa Jackson is also considering retirement.
Meanwhile, Johnny Srouji, who leads the chip division and has just launched Apple’s first self-developed cellular modem, is also evaluating his future at the company.