Updated Dec. 14 with more in-depth interview information with Tim Cook and hosting King Charles III in Apple’s Battersea HQ.
Apple CEO Tim Cook’s latest visit to London, on Wednesday, Dec. 11, was an opportunity to emphasize the company’s commitment to London and the U.K. Apple’s investment in the U.K. has been over $22 billion or £18 billion in the last five years, the company says. Cook was here as part of a bigger visit which culminated on Thursday, Dec. 12, in welcoming King Charles III to Apple’s Battersea HQ. When I was there, I saw Cook beaming and the king relaxed and engaged. In both parts of the trip, Cook’s considered positivity was on display.
Tim Cook.
Not least, he waxed positive about the country he was in, the U.K. There are 40 or so stores in the U.K., more than any other country in Europe, and the Battersea building is spectacular: airy, spacious and inspiring—the perfect workplace.
The first time I speak to him coincides with the day of release of iOS 18.2, with the second tranche of Apple Intelligence features. Except that for the U.K. and four other English-speaking countries, it is the first taste of all the new Apple Intelligence features.
“You’re getting everything at once,” Cook reminds me. “I’m always thrilled to be in the U.K., but I’m especially thrilled to be here on this day. It’s very special.” And he is a fan of London, commenting how great the city looks at Christmas (if tactfully failing to mention that it’s in the middle of an especially sharp cold snap).
He praised London’s capabilities as a city to play a role in the growth of AI, commenting on how the company has doubled its “engineer population” in the last few years, with many of them working on Apple Intelligence. He said he saw London as a great hub for artificial intelligence.
Apple was there to serve creativity, he told young people at Caius House, a youth center near Apple’s Battersea building, saying, “we’re all creative at the end of the day.”
When the king was in Apple’s HQ, I was close enough to hear his questions about Apple Intelligence as it was demonstrated to him. He was courteous and friendly, and seemed impressed by the way Image Wand could turn a doodle into an accomplished artwork.
While he talked to young people at Caius House, a youth center near Apple’s London HQ in Battersea, he was candid and open about his life and Apple’s latest features. Delrita Agyapong, CEO of Caius House told me how valuable Apple was to them. “We work with young people in Battersea, giving them support with improving their digital skills and helping them to reach their potential. It’s great to have Apple in the local community and, with their support, we’ve been able to give young people the opportunity to work with the latest technology and learn from experts about how to put theory into practice,” she said.
And in terms of experts, it’s hard to imagine someone better qualified than Cook—and the reaction when the Caius House surprise visitor was revealed to be Cook was palpable excitement.
I’ve seen Cook work the room like this before. He can take the “OMG, it’s him!” energy and use it to get to know people, putting them at their ease not least because of his effortlessly genuine interest.
Cook is a natural optimist, telling me how pleased he was to be back in London and how the city did Christmas so well. He answers an attendee’s question about how difficult it will be to get a job in the industry with comforting words, saying that these things go in cycles, suggesting that if it isn’t great now, it will be again. “I wouldn’t worry too much about that,” he says, reassuringly.
I ask Cook what it meant to him to be at events like these. “It means something to be able to give back,” he says, “and to connect with kids that are going to run the companies and businesses and governments in the future, and see what’s on their mind, to see what their dreams and aspirations are. It keeps me connected to youth, which is so important both from a personal point of view, but also from a business point of view.
Asked by the group about how he started out, he talks about his interest in computing, which spiked when he realized that it had great potential for helping people, connecting them. The spark came when he was at college, not high school. “Find what it is that you’re most curious about, and don’t worry if you don’t get that lightbulb moment immediately,” he tells the room populated mostly by teenagers. “Just keep pulling on that string.”
Cook listens attentively while Taiwo Omisore, an app developer, talks about how his first apps came about and how he was inspired as a kid when playing Super Mario Bros. on the Nintendo Entertainment System. “I was obsessed with why, when I pressed the button to the left, Mario leapt in that direction,” he says. After studying Computer Science at university he was working for the British supermarket Tesco and developing apps in his spare time. “When I built my first app, I had a long commute so I’d approach random people to get their thoughts, and they were very kind and gave really good feedback.” He has recently released 10 Games: Daily Brain Training, with puzzles and sudoku elements.
His advice to the listeners was supportive and clear: “I think you really need to take a moment to take a moment and write down what it is you want to do. Do you want to create an app? Or a website? Do you want to create a tool that’s going to make things better for people? Just do that. You can read every single tutorial in the world but at the end of the day what you need to do is just put something out there. When I talk to people, the thing that really accelerates their self-development is just by releasing things. Just take a step back, and just go forever.”
Succeeding in business is another question and Cook has plenty of tips. Don’t look in the rear-view mirror, always be looking forward instead of congratulating yourself on what you’ve achieved, surround yourself by a strong team of people and so on.
He talks about how he started out at Apple, saying that in 1997, the company, “and it may be hard for you to believe this, was thought to be on the verge of bankruptcy.” He goes on that Michael Dell, the CEO of Dell Computers, said that the best thing would be for Apple to be shuttered and the money given back to the shareholders. “And the only difference between Michael Dell and the rest of the industry was that he said it while everyone else was thinking it.”
None the less, he joined Apple because, “There was something about the twinkle in Steve Jobs’ eye, the way he was turning left while everyone else was turning right,” that appealed to him.
Asked about Apple Intelligence and where it would lead, Cook says, “We’re actually releasing iOS 18.2 today, and I would encourage you to get 18.2 in a hurry. It has many different parts of Apple Intelligence, from the ability to clean up a photo to writing tools to ChatGPT integration. There’s a ton of features in it but the elegance of it is that it’s integrated into the apps that you use every day. And the elegance of it is also that it’s private. It’s very unusual in that we’ve kept the processing either on-device or in a private cloud. In the future, you’ll see more features being added and it will just keep getting better and better. Artificial intelligence is a horizontal technology in that it will touch everything in your life over time. It will change everything. because it will be like having an assistant, to prepare things that it would have taken you longer to do, to free you up to spend more time, pulling that string of curiosity or creating or following your passion.”
One of the developers he met talked about the need to “always be iterating.” I ask Cook if that rings true for Apple, as well. “Yes, it’s the incredible, relentless drive that nothing is ever perfect. That there are always improvements to be made. And there’s the importance of being willing to view people’s feedback as jewels and continuing to make your craft better and better over time.”
As Cook met with app developers today, I wonder if the App Store is part of Apple’s focus on democratization. “Even before I worked there, Apple’s always been about democratization. The aim of putting a personal computer in every classroom. that doesn’t sound too ambitious, in 2024, but it was ambitious at the time,” he says.
“Then getting a personal computer for everyone, and then a smartphone in every pocket, the ability for everyone to be a photographer, to film a movie and then edit it. These things used to cost hundreds of thousands of pounds or more, and now all of a sudden you can put them in your pocket,” he says.
Cook has more examples of this, saying, “The ability to create music with Logic Pro or Garageband, all of these things are about providing tools for creative people to express themselves. In the same way, with the app development, it’s about giving developers tools and freeing them up from doing some of the heavy lifting of programming and the frameworks and APIs and so forth, enabling them to focus on their passion, you know, whether it’s fitness or gaming or whatever it may be.”
And he references a new feature that takes democratization in a new direction. “The latest example, perhaps is the Hearing Test. There are a billion and a half people with hearing problems in the world, and now we can democratize the hearing test, because very few people get one. It’s always about democratizing for us.”
That feature has just gone live on AirPods Pro 2, alongside iOS 18.2. So I ask Cook what Apple Intelligence means to him and to Apple.
“I think it means a whole new era for iPhone, because the difference with Apple Intelligence versus a usual feature is Apple Intelligence touches everything. It touches every application that you use so much of. It touches Notes, Mail, it touches Messaging. These apps that you live in today, it touches all of those, and so the integration is deep and very different than having to think, oh, I want to use Apple Intelligence, let me go to this special place. It’s in the places that you are already in. It starts a level of innovation that’s on a different trajectory for the future. I think it’s foundational and huge.”
