Apple Executives Answer Shareholders' Questions

by , 9:20 AM EDT, April 28th, 2006

Apple held its annual shareholders meeting on Thursday, with CEO Steve Jobs, CFO Peter Oppenheimer, and Senior Vice-President of Worldwide Marketing Phil Schiller answering attendees' questions. According to MacCentral's Jim Dalrymple, Mr. Jobs said in response to a query regarding upcoming releases: "The new products in the pipeline are the best I've ever seen in my life."

He added: "Intel has a great roadmap. This new [Core Duo] chip is phenomenal--it blows away anything other suppliers have, including our former suppliers." When someone asked about Apple making a media center for recording TV shows, Mr. Jobs replied: "We hear you loud and clear."

When the issue of an overall computer industry slowdown was raised, and someone asked how that might hurt Apple, he said: "You can talk about the negatives of 4 to 5 percent market share, but it's kind of like being in the ocean. We're on the bottom, so it doesn't matter what the weather is like up top."

Last year's meeting featured an irritated Mr. Jobs sparring with an environmental group that was upset over the company's recycling policies. Apple, however, announced a computer recycling program shortly before this year's meeting, taking some of the wind out of protesters' sails, although one attendee complained that Apple still lags behind other computer makers in how much hardware they've recycled.

Mr. Jobs rebutted those comments by noting that the Sierra Club recently placed Apple on its list of top 10 environmentally friendly companies and said: "So there is some kind of disconnect with your numbers." He also pointed out that Apple's stores will take PCs in addition to Macs, "because we like switchers, too."

Some attendees asked about Mr. Jobs' new role as a member of Disney's board of directors, and the CEO said he'll be spending less time doing that then when he was in charge of Pixar.