Acquired · Apple · History
History
Apple was founded in 1976 (Los Altos, California (Jobs's childhood home garage); incorporated in Cupertino). The timeline below traces every inflection point Acquired identified — founding, leadership changes, strategic pivots, crises, cultural moments.
The story
Steve Wozniak built the Apple I in 1975 for the Homebrew Computer Club — a hobbyist circuit board. Jobs saw a product. They sold fifty to Paul Terrell's Byte Shop in Mountain View and incorporated in April 1976. The Apple II (1977) was the first mass-market personal computer, profitable from launch and the engine that funded the Lisa and the Mac. Jobs's 1979 visit to Xerox PARC showed him the graphical interface and mouse — ideas Xerox had not commercialized. The Macintosh (1984) shipped them to the world. Jobs was pushed out in 1985, founded NeXT, and was brought back via the NeXT acquisition in 1997. What he returned to had forgotten the lesson: hardware and software must be one company.
Inflection points · grouped by decade
1970s
- 1976Founding
Apple Computer founded in Jobs's parents' garage
Wozniak built the Apple I for the Homebrew Computer Club; Jobs packaged and sold it. They incorporated April 1, 1976 with Ronald Wayne holding 10% (he sold his share days later for $800).
[Acquired NeXT live show]
- 1977Product
Apple II ships — first mass-market PC
Color graphics, a plastic case, and expansion slots made it genuinely usable. VisiCalc (1979) turned it into a business machine. Apple II revenues funded the Lisa and Mac.
[Acquired NeXT live show]
- 1979Strategic shift
Jobs visits Xerox PARC — GUI and mouse
Xerox showed Jobs the Alto graphical interface and the mouse in exchange for Apple pre-IPO stock options. Jobs immediately grasped the commercial application Xerox had not pursued.
[Acquired NeXT live show]
1980s
- 1980IPO
Apple IPO — largest since Ford in 1956
Raised $101M at a $1.8B valuation; over 300 employees became millionaires. The most successful IPO to that point since Ford Motor.
[Acquired NeXT live show]
- 1984Product
Macintosh launches — GUI computing for consumers
The '1984' Super Bowl ad and the machine itself established Apple's brand identity: technology that humanizes rather than intimidates. The first mass-market GUI computer.
[Acquired NeXT live show]
- 1985Crisis
Jobs ousted from Apple
Board backed CEO John Sculley over Jobs. Jobs founded NeXT that same year. Apple spent the next twelve years drifting — revenue grew briefly but the platform coherence Jobs had enforced unraveled.
[Acquired NeXT live show]
1990s
- 1997Strategic shift
Apple acquires NeXT for $429M — Jobs returns
Apple was weeks from bankruptcy when it bought NeXT. Jobs returned as 'interim CEO' (iCEO, a title he used for years). The deal brought back the OS architecture that became macOS and eventually iOS.
[Acquired NeXT live show]
2000s
- 2001Product
iPod + iTunes — hardware-software-services loop begins
iPod launched with iTunes as the management layer; iTunes Store (2003) added the commercial rails. The template — device + software + marketplace — became iPhone and the App Store.
[Acquired Apple Beats episode]
- 2007Product
iPhone announced — 'an iPod, a phone, and an internet communicator'
Jobs introduced three devices and revealed they were one. The iPhone had no App Store on launch day (that came 2008); it still killed Nokia, Motorola, and BlackBerry within five years.
[Acquired Apple Beats episode]
- 2008Product
App Store launches with iPhone OS 2.0
The App Store created the first mobile software marketplace with a single payment system, a curated trust signal, and Apple's 30% cut on every transaction.
[Acquired Apple Beats episode]
2010s
- 2014Acquired co.
Beats Electronics acquired for $3B
The Beats deal bought two things: Jimmy Iovine's relationships with the major labels (which Apple needed to launch a streaming service) and the Beats Music subscription that became Apple Music.
[Acquired Apple Beats episode]
2020s
- 2020Product
Apple Silicon (M1) — owns the chip too
Apple transitioned Macs from Intel to its own ARM-based M1. The chip-to-software integration reduced latency, extended battery life, and removed Intel from Apple's cost structure and release calendar.
[Apple FY2020 event + Acquired references]
- 2023Product
Apple Vision Pro announced — spatial computing bet
$3,499. The most expensive Apple product since the Mac Pro. A long-horizon bet on the next platform after the phone, following the exact hardware-software-services loop Apple has run since the iPod.
[Apple WWDC 2023 + Acquired references]