John Sculley, Zeta Global vice chairman emeritus and former Apple CEO, reacts to Apple's new iPhone Duo, the company's first foldable smartphone, which will have a 7.6-inch display when unfolded and a 5.4-inch outer screen. He speaks on "Bloomberg The Close."
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Questions asked in this interview
6
0:00... the presentation today, but when we talk about these big transitions, not only in terms of the leadership, but also in terms of the product lineup and how those products are marketed, how do you sort of look at the start of this new era?
1:02Was it the product itself or the way it was marketed?
4:20When you are talking about this idea that AI is pushing companies to innovate, is this enough to not just keep Apple competitive, but to also really differentiate the company when it comes to this market?
6:25... it clear everybody is trying to create all these new AI-related devices, and he says, "Look, there's about 1.5 billion people walking around with the perfect device for that already in their pocket." What did you make of that statement?
8:11Do you see a world where Ternus and Cook coexist peacefully and, more importantly, productively for the foreseeable future?
9:30Are you going to have to preorder this phone like everybody else, or as a former CEO, do they just kind of send you one in the mail automatically?
I don't know how much you got to see of the presentation today, but when we talk about these big transitions, not only in terms of the leadership, but also in terms of the product lineup and how those products are marketed, how do you sort of look at the start of this new era?
Well, I'm excited, and I think a lot of people are. John Ternus has an excellent reputation as someone who understands products, and, you know, products is more than building them and supplying them through the channels. Products are about focusing on what makes people really want a product and really appreciate it. And then word-of-mouth becomes incredibly powerful in terms of acceptance of products. And that's always been true with Apple. So I think it's a great time. And I think the number of products that are coming out—I've never seen so many products come out at one time from Apple. The foldable product is something I've wanted for a long time. I'm excited about it, but I'm excited about many of the things he's bringing to the market, so it's a pretty cool time at Apple.
You know, one of my colleagues said this morning that this is probably the first time in a while where Apple had to get on stage as CEO and actually explain why we need a certain product. And he's talking about basically the foldable iPhone that's going to cost $2,000 right out of the gate. I think about some of the product launches you oversaw, such as the wildly successful Macintosh iterations, and then, of course, some of the less successful ones, like the Newton. What was the separation between what was a success and what was not? Was it the product itself or the way it was marketed?
Well, I think in the case of the Mac—and the real credit has to go back to Steve Jobs—but when it first came to market, it was not successful. It was underpowered. The technology wasn't advanced enough. It really wasn't Steve's fault; it's just the technology was not going to be ready for several more years. And eventually, several years later, the Macintosh became incredibly successful and became the first multimedia computer. In the classic case of the Newton, we all knew in the computer industry that eventually there would be mobile devices. And what we did was probably a mistake. Actually, the Newton was introduced after I left Apple, but the mistake in the Newton was that it came before there was any experience with digital networks. Remember, this was years before Tim Berners-Lee introduced the World Wide Web. It was years before there were digital cell phones on the market. And it actually took almost 20 years before the market had all those other pieces in place for a product like the Newton or like the iPhone or like the BlackBerry. It just was too early.
If we pull on your marketing expertise—continue to do so here—I wanted to ask you about the price point, because we're looking at that starting model just under $2,000. Does that risk alienating any of Apple's consumer base? And how would you look at this moving forward? Would you market this as a productivity tool, as a high-end luxury item? Both? Maybe neither?
Well, first of all, I would market it for what I think it has to do best, and that it has to be trusted intelligence. And what makes Apple different with a new CEO coming in is that it's not just about making a product that's ideal for the internet; it's making a product that is ideal for the era of AI. And AI means intelligence that can do useful things, and AI is all about experience. I remember the early conversations Steve Jobs and I had when we started working together, and we were talking about marketing. And I said, "Steve, it isn't just about getting things that your customer wants; it's about getting things that really make an impact on the experience of what a customer does with our product." And so true today, even more than it was back when Steve and I worked together. Because with mobile devices, particularly with AI becoming so important, the experience has to be something which is going to be as defining as what the product looks like.
Do you think the next innovation needs to come to market any faster? We're talking about how this is the first major redesign of the iPhone in nearly two decades. When you are talking about this idea that AI is pushing companies to innovate, is this enough to not just keep Apple competitive, but to also really differentiate the company when it comes to this market?
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Sculley, J. (2026, September 9). Former Apple CEO Sculley 'Excited' About iPhone Duo [Interview transcript]. Bloomberg Television. CEOInterviews.AI. https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/1329571/
MLA
John Sculley. "Former Apple CEO Sculley 'Excited' About iPhone Duo." Bloomberg Television, 9 Sep. 2026. Transcript, CEOInterviews.AI, https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/1329571/.
BibTeX
@misc{sculley2026_1329571,
author = {John Sculley},
title = {Former Apple CEO Sculley 'Excited' About iPhone Duo},
howpublished = {Interview transcript, Bloomberg Television. CEOInterviews.AI},
year = {2026},
month = {sep},
url = {https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/1329571/},
note = {Speaker-attributed transcript with timestamps}
}
