The transition from Apple to Apple Silicon has drawn the attention of many, including former Microsoft executive Steven Sinofsky, who said the move impressed him.
On the night after Apple’s WWDC 2020 keynote, former Windows Division President at Microsoft Steven Sinofsky took to Twitter to discuss the importance of the Annual Conference of Apple and Apple Developers as a whole.
In the midst of all the details, the preview build, and the comments (including mine), I want to take a moment to reflect on #WWDC to put it in context over the past two decades. In short, what we are seeing is one of the most notable product engineering throughout history. 1 / pic.twitter.com/hTrQ1R7Pgv
– Steven Sinofsky (@stevesi) June 23, 2020
Later he went on to write down his Twitter thread in a medium post. In it, he offers an idea of what distinguishes Apple from other companies. Sinofsky believes that Apple has created a team that “has done more and performed better” than anyone else it can name.
This is high praise, considering that Sinofsky joined Microsoft in 1989 and continued to work with the company until 2012. He is best known for overseeing the development of Microsoft Office during his tenure.
He applauds Apple for not being afraid of having a multi-year plan, and calls the company “intrepid” for openly telling its audience that the transition to Apple Silicon would take two years.
Apple Silicon is Apple’s departure from Intel processors. Apple Silicon offers a host of benefits, including high-efficiency audio processing, low-power video playback, advanced power management, machine learning accelerators, Neural Engine, Apple GPUs, a unified memory architecture, and much more. .
Sinofsky braves Tim Cook for making the announcement when anything and everything could change within two years, not to mention how much could go wrong. He claims that Apple is capable of making such moves because it has a culture of having a “point of view”.
Praise Apple for taking the time to think about what customers need, not chasing trends. By doing so, Apple can offer a product that offers long-lasting service that integrates into a user’s life, rather than something that just fits well into a short-lived trend.
“Apple makes products that customers love and love, but it makes them by studying the technology, the market, and the usage to come up with plans and strategies,” Sinofsky writes. “Unlike what you read in textbooks, Apple has a lot less to do with responding to micro changes, hype cycles, or even” comments. ”
“Apple is a company that has a point of view: when the point of view is aligned with a great product that people love, it can become an unstoppable force.”
As an example, he cites the transition to 64-bit computing at the consumer level. Microsoft started the change around 2003 and continues to support 32-bit to this day. Apple, on the other hand, started requiring developers to build 64-bit apps in 2017, and stopped supporting 32-bit apps in 2019 along with the release of macOS Catalina.
Apple’s ability to think differently is a driving force behind its success.
Sinofsky calls this strategy “intrepid” and considers it the reason why Apple will be able to transition to Apple Silicon. Apple’s ability to operate under a uniform strategy, a shared point of view and the culture of the company allows them to make bold moves. These bold moves propel personal computing, nothing to say about smartphones, forward.
One of the things Sinofsky makes sure to highlight is how different Apple’s performance is compared to other companies. Perhaps what impresses you the most is Apple’s ability to update its products and software consistently. He describes the process as setting long-term goals that are then broken down into a series of short-term goals and useful steps.
Apple does not go astray in the same way as other large companies, and this dedication to long-term goals has allowed the company to succeed where many would have failed.
Sinofsky makes it clear that this strategy does not work, and will not work, for all companies. It is a company culture that has been cultivated for several decades, and has required much more than a shared point of view. It takes dedication, teamwork and endless research. Sinofsky suggests that it may even take a little magic.
End the article with some practical advice.
“There is only one Apple. Don’t try to copy,” says Sinofsky.
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