Regret Maps flub, proudest of Apple Watch: Cook

He pushed into new areas, like larger and smaller iPads, more types of iPhones, and AirPods, as CEO

- BLOOMBERG

Apple chief executive officer (CEO) Tim Cook, who plans to step down in a few months, cited the launch of Apple Maps on the iPhone in 2012 as his “first really big mistake” as the company’s boss.

The maps app famously didn’t work properly in much of the world, providing users with wrong directions, mislabeled landmarks and a far inferior experience to what was then offered by Google on the iPhone.

“The product wasn’t ready, and we thought it was because we were testing more of local kind of stuff,” Cook said during a town hall meeting on Tuesday with his recently named successor, John Ternus.

The launch ultimately led to the first big management shakeup of Cook’s tenure, when he fired software chief Scott Forstall. That executive was a close collaborator of Cook's predecessor, cofounder Steve Jobs.