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iCon—Steve Jobs: The Greatest Second Act in the History of Business
From Issue 14 of our newsletter.
This is a fascinating book! To be fully enthralled, it does help if you lived through the late 60’s/early 70’s or, if younger, are interested in the culture and energy of the period. Steve Jobs is a child of his times, a natural rebel against orthodoxy; he indulged in many of the fashionable experiments that were then common; mind expanding drugs and walking in the Himalayas in search of a guru, to name two.
iCon is also a dramatic ‘rags-to-riches’ story. Steve Jobs was an orphan adopted by a working-class couple; he dropped out of education early and with a typical boyish streak became interested in what you could put together with electronic components, and worked briefly for the games company Atari. After meeting Steve Wozniak, the beginnings of Apple started in a Silicon Valley garage.
Young and Simon chart the rise of Apple and the internal battles that occurred as Steve tried to impose himself on his close colleagues and staff. Thrown out of Apple, effectively by John Scully, the man Steve had brought in to be CEO, he turned his hand to his new venture, NeXT. It was around the start of NeXT that he discovered his biological parents and his sister Mona Simpson, the novelist.
There are moments when you may feel out of sympathy with Steve Jobs. He could be unpleasant and thoughtless about others and fail to recognise the enormous contributions made by some of the talented people he managed to have around.
Pixar, the company Steve formed from the computer animation business purchased from George Lucas, the creator of Star Wars, brought Steve Jobs into the movie business, the partnership with Disney and the tussles with Michael Eisner. A great success, the company created among others Buzz Lightyear, the clown fish Nemo and The Incredibles, all testing and breaking new barriers in the use of creative technology.
Then the book’s long finale, the return to Apple, the recovery of the business and the move into the music business with the iPod. It is a great story and thoroughly recommended.