Apple’s new CEO John Ternus steps into the spotlight

Apple’s next chief executive officer (CEO) John Ternus is a company veteran who rose through the iPhone maker's hardware engineering ranks but until now has maintained a low profile.

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John Ternus is an Apple veteran who rose through the iPhone maker's hardware engineering ranks.

(AFP)

Ternus will take over as chief executive in September for Tim Cook, who turned Apple into a $4 trillion, tech colossus during his 15-year reign after the death of co-founder Steve Jobs.

Ternus, 50, has spent almost his entire career with Apple. He joined the company 25 years ago and has spent the past five years overseeing the engineering that underlies the iPhone, iPad, and Mac.

It's made him a prime contender to succeed Cook who on Monday, when Apple announced the change in leadership, hailed Ternus as “without question the right person to lead Apple into the future”.

Ternus worked on some of Apple's signature products under Cook, including the Apple Watch, AirPods and Apple Vision Pro. He was also involved in the MacBook Neo, “arguably one of the most disruptive products” that Apple has released in a while, said Ben Wood, chief analyst at CCS Insight.