iMac and Design Principles

By Max Patera

“Think Different”• Jobs asks Lee Clow (1984)

to come back

• Clow’s team comes up with new slogan

• Jobs cries thinking about the purity

• Image campaign emphasizing creativity of users and employees – the stakeholders of Apple’s projects

• Used photos of Jobs’s heroes

iCEO

• Jobs decides to take over officially as interim CEO (iCEO) instead of just being the de facto leader in September 1997

• Apple searched for permanent CEO, but most weren't interested if Jobs would still be on the board

• Running two companies at once took a toll on Jobs's health

Clones

• Wozniak favored approach of licensing OS to manufacturers

• A few other manufacturers were given licenses to sell Mac OS before Jobs came back

• Jobs felt hardware and software should be tightly integrated, and stopped making new versions of Mac OS for existing clones

Too Many Products

• Jobs knew how to focus, and how to decide what not to do

• He hated PowerPoints at product reviews - “People who know what they're talking about don't need PowerPoint”

• Products had multiple versions

• Jobs asked, “Which ones do I tell my friends to buy?”

• He started canceling products, including printers and Newton

• Over 3000 people laid off, $1.04 billion lost the year he came back

• Apple soon started making a profit again

On the Whiteboard

Consumer Pro

Desktop iMac Power Macintosh G3

Portable iBook Powerbook G3

Initiation of iMac project

Jonathan Ive

• Jony Ive was head of the design team – key person

• He was about to quit before Jobs took over

• He bonded with Jobs because they both thought design was very important

• Simplicity

• Culture was focused ondesigning simplicity

• Designed packaging, too

iMac

• First great collaboration of Ive and Jobs

• Scope: should be all-in-one (like original Macintosh), with keyboard and monitor, usable right out of the box, distinctive design, sell for around $1,200

• Original plan was a network computer with no hard drive

• They decided to leave out the floppy drive

• Translucent Bondi Blue case allowed the internal design to be seen

• Clow's team came up with the name

Completing the iMac• Engineers had 38 reasons why they couldn't do

it, but Jobs made them do it anyway

• As the deadline approached, the process was going slowly, and Jobs got angry

• They finished just in time, launched in May 1998

• Jobs was angry that the CD drive wasn't the one he wanted

• Mike Markkula thought the hockey puck mouse wouldn't be liked, and he was right

• Sold 800,000 the first year for $1,299 each – fastest selling Apple ever

• 32% were buying computers for the first time

More colors came soon

WBS

iMac

Case Insides Peripherals

Computer Monitor

Keyboard Mouse

Lessons Learned

• Jobs knows what he's doing

• Focusing on design and simplicity works

• Using experts for advertising and design is a good idea

• Reducing the number of products the company is working on, and focusing on just a few works well