Forstall leaving Apple

I was about to leave the apartment for the morning rounds, but couldn't resist the urge to get this entry across, having woken up to this news.

No, it wasn't about Sandy pounding the Big Apple. But Apple itself, having an internal shake down.

The blogs had been abuzz about the friction at the top between Scott Forstall and the other Senior VP at Apple. Scott was in charge of the development of the iOS, and it became clear that the iOS 6 did not innovate as much as it was expected. Not to the extend that Jelly Bean did compared to the previous iteration of Android.

Add to this the debacle that was the Apple Maps, and the writing was on the wall. It was rumoured that Scott was more keen to move Apple towards a more skeuomorphic - real-life imitation - design elements, while the other gurus, Sir Jonny Ives included opposed this. Clearly somebody had to go.

Announcing the news while the US was looking forward to Sandy and the Presidential election was a touch or PR genius. The announcement also included that the SVP for retail, John Browett was also leaving. He had just joined Apple less than a year ago, taking over from Ron Johnson, the real architect behind the Apple retail store experience. Mr Johnson is currently the CEO of JC Penney, and was recruited as a highly prized asset across.

Will this signal a further change at the top of Apple? Bob Mansfield was due to leave, but was invited back to be the special advisor to Tim Cook. Maybe Bob was giving the company an ultimatum as far Scott's tenure was concerned.

Either way, Scott Forstall is leaving and Apple had to move on with things. He will officially leave some time next year, and for the interim, Craig Federighi would overlook both the OS X and iOS.