From the Business Standard: Apple has accelerated its succession plans as the company prepares for Chief Executive Tim Cook to potentially step down as early as next year, Financial Times reported. Apple's board and senior leaders have recently increased their focus on a smooth leadership transition after Cook's more than 14 years at the helm of the $4 trillion tech giant, the news report said. John Ternus, senior Vice-President of hardware engineering, is seen by many inside Apple as the top contender to become the next CEO. However, no final decision has been made yet. The leadership shift has been in the works for years and is not connected to its present performance, the news report said. Apple expects a strong year-end sales season, especially for the iPhone... Cook, who turned 65 this month, became Apple's CEO in 2011 after the passing of co-founder Steve Jobs. Under his leadership, Apple's market value has grown from around $350 billion in 2011 to $4 trillion today. Apple's stock is near a record high following strong results last month. Apple "is unlikely to introduce a new CEO before its earnings report in late January, which covers the crucial holiday quarter," the article points out. "An early-year announcement would allow the next leadership team time to settle before Apple's major annual events — the Worldwide Developers Conference in June and the iPhone launch in September..." Slashdot reader BrianFagioli points out that top-contender Ternus "is deeply technical and has been central to Apple Silicon and the hardware comeback in the Mac line." If Apple elevates him, that would be an unmistakable signal that the board wants a return to stronger, more grounded hardware leadership. The company may finally realize that accessories aren't enough to keep Apple fans excited, and that expensive experiments are not a substitute for devices people can actually use and afford... Financial success can only hide hardware misfires for so long. Apple needs a leader who can reconnect the company with its reputation for creating devices people can't live without, not ones people return or ignore. Tech blogger John Gruber "absolutely loves" the idea of Cook's successor "being a product person like Ternus, and Ternus is young enoughâ — â50, the same age Cook was in 2011 when he took the reins from Steve Jobsâ — âto hold the job for a long stretch." Ternus took over iPhone hardware engineering in 2020, and was promoted to senior vice president of hardware engineering in January 2021, when Dan Riccio stepped aside. Apple's hardware, across all product lines and including silicon, has been exemplary under Ternus's leadership. And Ternus clearly loves and understands the Mac. I would also bet that Cook moves into the role of executive chairman, and will still play a significant, if not leading, role for the company. And Gruber makes another observation about that Financial Times article. "That 'several people' spoke to the FT about this says to me that those sources (members of the board?) did so with Cook's blessing, and they want this announcement to be no more than a little surprising."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Get caught up on the latest technology and startup news from the past week. Here are the most popular stories on GeekWire for the week of Nov. 9, 2025.

Sign up to receive these updates every Sunday in your inbox by subscribing to our GeekWire Weekly email newsletter.

Most popular stories on GeekWire

The rise and fall of Rad Power Bikes: From breakout success to the brink of shutdown

Rad started as a scrappy hardware startup and grew into the largest e-bike seller in North America. … Read More

Rad Power Bikes faces possible shutdown as it tries to survive ‘significant financial challenges’

A potential closure, detailed in a required state filing, would spell the end of the company and mark a stunning collapse for Rad Power Bikes, which was once Seattle’s highest-profile consumer hardware startup, riding pandemic-era e-bike demand to unicorn status. … Read More

Cadence to acquire Seattle startup ChipStack to boost chip design automation

ChipStack emerged from Seattle’s AI2 Incubator in 2023 and raised more than $7 million. … Read More

‘Project Kuiper’ no more: Amazon renames satellite internet venture ‘Leo’ on path to commercial debut

Amazon rebrands its effort to expand global access to high-speed internet: Project Kuiper will now be known as Amazon Leo Read More … Read More

Inside Microsoft’s new ‘Experience Center One’: What we learned at the edge of the AI frontier

In the glowing demo rooms of Microsoft’s new Experience Center One, the company is making a high-stakes pitch for the potential of AI agents — attempting to get businesses on board with its vision of the future. … Read More

Vancouver, B.C.-based legal tech company Clio hits $5B valuation after acquiring vLex

The completion of the deal, first announced in June, coincides with the closing of a $500 million Series G funding round for Clio. … Read More

Bezos-backed real estate startup Arrived raises $27M to help fuel new ‘stock market’ for rental properties

Arrived lets people buy fractional shares of single-family rental homes and vacation rentals for as little as $100. … Read More

Seattle’s long history of hardware heartbreak: Big raises, high hopes, hard landings

Seattle’s consumer-hardware ambitions are once again colliding with economic reality. … Read More

Valve surprises with 3 new hardware devices in a full-circle moment for gaming giant

Planned for release in early 2026, the devices are described as new parts of the “Steam Hardware family.” Read More … Read More

Former startup CFO convicted of wire fraud for moving $35M in company funds to crypto side business

The former chief financial officer of onetime Seattle e-commerce startup Fabric has been convicted of four counts of wire fraud for taking and misusing around $35 million from his former employer. … Read More

Dr. Fei-Fei Li is known as the “godmother of AI.” She’s been at the center of AI’s biggest breakthroughs for over two decades. She spearheaded ImageNet, the dataset that sparked the deep-learning revolution we’re living right now, served as Google Cloud’s Chief AI Scientist, directed Stanford’s Artificial Intelligence Lab, and co-founded Stanford’s Institute for Human-Centered AI. In this conversation, Fei-Fei shares the rarely told history of how we got here—including the wild fact that just nine years ago, calling yourself an AI company was basically a death sentence.

We discuss:

1. How ImageNet helped spark the AI explosion we’re living through

2. Why world models and spatial intelligence represent the next frontier in AI, beyond large language models

3. Why Fei-Fei believes AI won’t replace humans but will require us to take responsibility for ourselves

4. The surprising applications of Marble, from movie production to psychological research

5. Why robotics faces unique challenges compared with language models and what’s needed to overcome them

6. How to participate in AI regardless of your role

—

Brought to you by:

Figma Make—A prompt-to-code tool for making ideas real

Justworks—The all-in-one HR solution for managing your small business with confidence

Sinch—Build messaging, email, and calling into your product

—

Transcript: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-godmother-of-ai

—

My biggest takeaways (for paid newsletter subscribers):

https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/i/178223233/my-biggest-takeaways-from-this-conversation

—

Where to find Dr. Fei-Fei Li

• X: https://x.com/drfeifei

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fei-fei-li-4541247

• World Labs: https://www.worldlabs.ai

—

Where to find Lenny:

• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com

• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/

—

In this episode, we cover:

(00:00) Introduction to Dr. Fei-Fei Li

(05:31) The evolution of AI

(09:37) The birth of ImageNet

(17:25) The rise of deep learning

(23:53) The future of AI and AGI

(29:51) Introduction to world models

(40:45) The bitter lesson in AI and robotics

(48:02) Introducing Marble, a revolutionary product

(51:00) Applications and use cases of Marble

(01:01:01) The founder’s journey and insights

(01:10:05) Human-centered AI at Stanford

(01:14:24) The role of AI in various professions

(01:18:16) Conclusion and final thoughts

—

References: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-godmother-of-ai

—

Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com.

—

Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.

To hear more, visit www.lennysnewsletter.com



Download audio: https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/178223233/a1604c36f9d36040e80df5a6452af1a8.mp3

---

Good morning, programs. I'm sorry for the light posting the last few weeks, but, it's all for a good reason. Last week was my first week at my new job, which means all of my anxiety and fear are gone. Ok, maybe not, but, I'm absolutely delighted to be off the market again. I haven't blogged about the new job yet (or even gotten around to updating LinekdIn), but I'll do so soon. (My job isn't top secret or anything, I'm just waiting a bit.) Ok, let's get to the links!

A Conditional Form Field Web Component

I love web components, and I especially love really practical examples like this conditional form field component by Aaron Gustafson. As you can probably guess, it allows conditionally showing and hiding form fields based on other fields on the form. Here's an example from his post that demonstrates that I mean:

<form-show-if conditions="contact_method=phone">
  <label for="phone">Phone Number
    <input type="tel" id="phone" name="phone">
  </label>
</form-show-if>

Both the label and field will only show up when the form field contact_method is set to "phone". In that example only one field is checked, but your logic can check against multiple as well.

Web MIDI with Katie Fenn

This is from back in May, but this presentation by Katie Fenn covers the Web MIDI spec, and of course, goes into MIDI itself. Best of all, it features music by Daft Punk, not something you see often with web platform talks.

Play Video

The Origin Story of JavaScript

Finally, another video, but one that's fun as hell to watch. Annie Sexton gives an entertaining look at how our favorite language (ok, maybe that's a bit controversial) language came to be:

Play Video

Just For Fun

Ok, so I don't usually like so many of my links to be videos, but as yall know, I like to end these posts with a music video typically. This track is absolutely not new, but is one of the most happy songs I've ever heard.

Play Video

Understand how AI Agents reduce costs, increase productivity, automate work, and replace repetitive human tasks. A deep quantitative and qualitative analysis of AI Agent ROI for developers, leaders, and enterprises.