Apple’s New CEO Is Bringing a Familiar Face Back From Retirement. The Shift Is Happening.

Apple (AAPL) is about to hand its top position to an engineer, and the early signs suggest the company’s focus may be shifting even more toward its products. John Ternus becomes CEO on September 1, taking over from Tim Cook, who steps into the role of executive chairman. Ternus is not a finance or operations leader like Cook. He has spent his whole career in hardware, having joined Apple’s product design team in 2001 and running its hardware engineering since 2013.

His track record is stacked with the products people actually hold. Ternus helped bring the iPad and AirPods to life, and oversaw hardware work across the iPhone, Mac, and Apple Watch. More recently, his teams redefined the iPhone 17 lineup, including the thin iPhone Air, and gave AirPods the ability to work as hearing aids. Even Cook, while announcing the handover, described Ternus as having “the mind of an engineer, the soul of an innovator.”