Source:BIT Securities

On September 1, Apple welcomed a highly significant day: Tim Cook's 15-year tenure as CEO officially came to an end, and hardware business head John Ternus took over on the same day.

In the current AI craze, the core question facing Ternus upon his appointment is undoubtedly—how to help this consumer electronics giant, rooted in hardware, re-establish its competitive edge in the AI era.

1. The Tepid Apple Suddenly Targeted by OpenAI

During this AI wave, Apple's performance has been rather steady, not falling behind, but far from being the main character.

However, the latest reported news might allow Apple to regain its ticket to the AI table: OpenAI has purchased tens of thousands of screenless, keyboard-less Mac minis and Mac Studios for reinforcement learning training and the development of "computer operation" type AI agents; Anthropic is also renting Mac computing power on a large scale through AWS.

Why are AI companies all focusing on Macs? The answer lies in Apple's chip architecture. Apple's chips use a unified memory architecture that can directly load quantized models with hundreds of billions, even trillions, of parameters—eliminating the need to transport data back and forth between GPU memory and main memory like NVIDIA GPUs. For those running large models, the savings are not just in time, but also significant monetary costs.

2. Financial Reports Have Already Moved: Macs Become Apple's Fastest-Growing Hardware

The influx of enterprise-level demand is directly reflected in the reports. The latest quarterly revenue for Mac grew nearly 29% year-over-year, reaching $10.3 billion, making it Apple's fastest-growing hardware product line.

An even more convincing signal comes from competitors: NVIDIA internally views Apple as the biggest competitor in the local AI market. Their previously launched DGX Spark looks remarkably similar to Mac mini—a homage from NVIDIA and itself a form of status recognition.

3. New Chief Ternus: A Productist from Mac Engineer

So, who is Ternus, Apple's new appointee at this crucial moment? Ternus has actually been at Apple for 25 years. He started as a Mac engineer and has since led the development of iPad, AirPods, iPhone, until he took charge of the entire hardware engineering system; he is recognized within Apple as a hardware expert.

Upon his appointment, challenges were already lined up: the iPhone new product launch in September and the full deployment of the new Siri AI.

The new product pipeline he is leading can be described as ambitious: this fall, Apple is set to launch a foldable iPhone and a smart display device capable of recognizing speakers and personalizing content accordingly. Whether these products can deliver on their promises will directly determine if Apple can maintain its ground in the AI hardware race.

4. The Subtext of the Board: Apple Lacks Not Money, But the Next Product Innovation

Looking back at this leadership change, the choice itself is sending a message.

In the past decade, Apple excelled in operations, supply chain, ecosystem, and profitability. But entering the AI era, what Apple truly lacks is neither money nor users, but the "next product innovation." Hence, the board did not choose a financially focused CEO but handed the reins to a product-oriented individual with a mechanical engineering background and 25 years of hardware experience.

In the short term, the CEO change will have limited impact on stock prices, as Cook will continue to serve as executive chairman, preventing any power vacuum. What truly determines Apple's future valuation is not selling a few more million units of the next-generation iPhone, but whether Apple can find new entry points in the AI era. In the next 3 to 5 years, Apple's biggest bet may no longer be the iPhone, but the combination of "AI + chips + new hardware entry."

5. Final Thoughts

Fifteen years ago, Cook took over Apple from Jobs, propelling the company to the pinnacle of global market value through operations and supply chain. Fifteen years later, the board handed the scepter to a hardware engineer, openly acknowledging that the dividends from the "operational era" have run out, and Apple must return to the "product innovation era."

OpenAI's bulk purchase of Mac minis and NVIDIA naming Apple as the top local AI competitor indicate that Apple has in its hand the ticket to the AI era—the chip with a unified memory architecture. What it has lacked in the past is the imaginative products needed to utilize this ticket.

Whether Ternus can fill this gap will soon become clear at the fall launch event, and the real answer will emerge in the next three to five years.

【Risk Warning】This article is written and provided by an external contributor. The personnel arrangement information mentioned has been verified, but the specific procurement numbers, institutional judgments, and strategic interpretations involved are derived from public reports and market analysis, and may contain inaccuracies. The views, analyses, and judgments in this article represent the author's personal opinions and do not represent the official position of BIT or BIT Research. BIT does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or timeliness of the related content. This article does not constitute investment advice, an offer, or an invitation to offer, nor does it constitute a recommendation for the buying or selling of any securities. Investment involves risks of principal loss, market prices may fluctuate significantly, and past performance does not guarantee future results. Investors should make independent judgments and seek professional advice.

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