History of Apple 2012 – The Most Significant Events

By 2012, Apple had a huge line-up of high-end personal computers, iPods, iPhones and iPads. The electronic giant has also developed a thriving business through the iTunes Store, selling music, video, and applications for both iOS and MacOS. Apple’s attitude of “Thinking Differently” proved great vision and not always doing the same things as the competition. In 2012, Apple was bold and occasionally put a few noses out of joint, but that’s the price paid for thinking outside the box.

iPhone 5 review [Video]

Video uploaded by The Verge on September 20, 2012.

History of the Apple Computer

Apple History 2012

January 19, 2012: Apple announces an all-new iTunes U app, giving educators and students everything they need on their iPad, iPhone and iPod touch to teach and take entire courses. The all-new iTunes U app lets teachers create and manage courses including essential components such as lectures, assignments, books, quizzes and syllabuses and offer them to millions of iOS users around the world. The iTunes U app gives iOS users access to the catalog of free educational content from top universities including Cambridge, Duke, Harvard, Oxford and Stanford, and starting today any K-12 school district can offer full courses through the iTunes U app. iTunes U has already become a popular learning tool for students with over 700 million downloads. Prior to iTunes U, only students in the classroom at that time had access to educational content from top universities. With the iTunes U app for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch, those barriers no longer exist. Students anywhere can take an entire course with complete access to all course materials right at their fingertips. With the iTunes U app, students are able to access new books right from within the app, and any notes taken in iBooks are consolidated for easy reviewing. In addition to reading books, viewing presentations, lectures and assignment lists, students can receive push notifications so they always have the latest class information. The iTunes U app is available today as a free download from the App Store.

Fortune magazine cover. June 2012. How Tim Cook is changing Apple. The new CEO’s Daunting Task of Replacing a Legend.

January 19, 2012: Apple announces iBooks 2 for iPad, featuring iBooks textbooks, an entirely new kind of textbook that’s dynamic, engaging and truly interactive. iBooks textbooks offer iPad users fullscreen textbooks with interactive animations, diagrams, photos, videos, unrivaled navigation and much more. iBooks textbooks can be kept up to date, don’t weigh down a backpack and never have to be returned. Leading education services companies including Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, McGraw-Hill and Pearson will deliver educational titles on the iBookstore with most priced at $14.99 or less, and with the new iBooks Author, a free authoring tool available today, anyone with a Mac can create stunning iBooks textbooks. “Education is deep in Apple’s DNA and iPad may be our most exciting education product yet. With 1.5 million iPads already in use in education institutions, including over 1,000 one-to-one deployments, iPad is rapidly being adopted by schools across the US and around the world,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “Now with iBooks 2 for iPad, students have a more dynamic, engaging and truly interactive way to read and learn, using the device they already love.”

January 30, 2012: Apple today announced that John Browett will join the company as senior vice president of Retail, reporting to Apple CEO Tim Cook. Browett comes to Apple from European technology retailer Dixons Retail, where he has been CEO since 2007. Beginning in April, he will be responsible for Apple’s retail strategy and the continued expansion of Apple retail stores around the world. “Our retail stores are all about customer service, and John shares that commitment like no one else we’ve met,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “We are thrilled to have him join our team and bring his incredible retail experience to Apple.” Prior to joining Dixons Retail, Browett held a series of executive positions at Tesco plc including CEO of Tesco.com. Earlier in his career he advised retail and consumer goods clients at Boston Consulting Group. He holds a degree in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University and an MBA from Wharton Business School. Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and professional software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iPods and iTunes online store. Apple has reinvented the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App Store, and is defining the future of mobile media and computing devices with iPad.

January 31, 2012: Apple releases Final Cut Pro X v10.0.3, a significant update to its revolutionary professional video editing application, which introduces multicam editing that automatically syncs up to 64 angles of video and photos; advanced chrome keying for handling complex adjustments right in the app; and enhanced XML for a richer interchange with third party apps and plug-ins that support the fast growing Final Cut Pro X ecosystem. Available today as a free update from the Mac App Store, Final Cut Pro X v10.0.3 also includes a beta of broadcast monitoring that supports Thunderbolt devices as well as PCIe cards. Final Cut Pro X v10.0.3 includes a collection of groundbreaking new tools for editing multicam projects. Final Cut Pro X automatically syncs clips from your shoot using audio waveforms, time and date, or timecode to create a Multicam Clip with up to 64 angles of video, which can include mixed formats, frame sizes and frame rates. The powerful Angle Editor allows you to dive into your Multicam Clip to make precise adjustments, and the Angle Viewer lets you play back multiple angles at the same time and seamlessly cut between them.

February 13, 2012: Apple announces that the Fair Labor Association will conduct special voluntary audits of Apple’s final assembly suppliers, including Foxconn factories in Shenzhen and Chengdu, China, at Apple’s request. A team of labor rights experts led by FLA president Auret van Heerden began the first inspections Monday morning at the facility in Shenzhen known as Foxconn City. “We believe that workers everywhere have the right to a safe and fair work environment, which is why we’ve asked the FLA to independently assess the performance of our largest suppliers,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “The inspections now underway are unprecedented in the electronics industry, both in scale and scope, and we appreciate the FLA agreeing to take the unusual step of identifying the factories in their reports.

February 16, 2012: Apple releases a developer preview of OS X Mountain Lion, the ninth major release of the world’s most advanced operating system, which brings popular apps and features from iPad to the Mac and accelerates the pace of OS X innovation. Mountain Lion introduces Messages, Notes, Reminders and Game Center to the Mac, as well as Notification Center, Share Sheets, Twitter integration and AirPlay Mirroring. Mountain Lion is the first OS X release built with iCloud in mind for easy setup and integration with apps. The developer preview of Mountain Lion also introduces Gatekeeper, a revolutionary security feature that helps keep you safe from malicious software by giving you complete control over what apps are installed on your Mac. The preview release of Mountain Lion is available to Mac Developer Program members starting today. Mac users will be able to upgrade to Mountain Lion from the Mac App Store in late summer 2012.

March 7, 2012: Apple presents the third generation iPad and the third generation of Apple TV. Apple CEO Tim Cook explains that the new Apple TV is externally identical to the second generation model. It includes a single-core A5 processor. The model also supports 1080p content from iTunes and Netflix.

March 7, 2012: Apple announces the new Apple TV featuring 1080p programming including iTunes movies and TV shows, Netflix, Vimeo, photos and more in HD. With iTunes in the Cloud, customers can purchase and play their favorite movies and TV shows from the iTunes Store and watch them instantly on their HD TV. The new Apple TV features a simpler, refined user interface making it easier than ever to access your purchased movies, TV shows and music with iTunes Match right from iCloud. With AirPlay, users can stream or mirror their favorite content from their iPad or iPhone 4S to Apple TV. “People are going to love streaming movies and TV shows in 1080p with the new Apple TV, and photos look beautiful displayed at the maximum resolution of your TV,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “Apple TV is easier than ever to use with its new icon-based interface and the ability to access your purchased movies, TV shows and music right from iCloud.”

March 7, 2012: Apple today introduces iPhoto for iPad and iPhone and major updates to iMovie and GarageBand, completing its suite of iLife apps for iOS. iPhoto includes Multi-Touch features so the user can use simple gestures to sort through hundreds of photos and find the best shots, enhance and retouch the images using fingertip brushes and share stunning photo journals with iCloud. iMovie now gives the user the ability to create amazing Hollywood-style trailers as you record HD video on the iPad and iPhone. GarageBand introduces Jam Session, an innovative and fun feature that allows a group of friends to wirelessly connect their iOS devices to play instruments and record live music together. Each app takes full advantage of the stunning Retina display on the new iPad for incredibly sharp and realistic images and video. The new iPad also features a 5 megapixel iSight camera so the user can record, edit and watch 1080p HD video all on the device.

March 7, 2012: Apple introduces the new iPad, the third generation of its category defining mobile device, featuring a new Retina display, Apple’s new A5X chip with quad-core graphics and a 5 megapixel iSight camera with advanced optics for capturing amazing photos and 1080p HD video. iPad with Wi-Fi + 4G connects to fast networks worldwide, including AT&T’s and Verizon’s 4G LTE networks, and still delivers the same all-day 10 hour battery life while remaining amazingly thin and light. iPad 2 will be offered at $399. The new iPad has the highest resolution display ever seen on a mobile device with 3.1 million pixels, delivering razor sharp text and unbelievable detail in photos and videos.

March 19, 2012: Apple announces plans to initiate a dividend and share repurchase program commencing later this year. Subject to declaration by the Board of Directors, the Company plans to initiate a quarterly dividend of $2.65 per share sometime in the fourth quarter of its fiscal 2012, which begins on July 1, 2012. Additionally, the Company’s Board of Directors has authorized a $10 billion share repurchase program commencing in the Company’s fiscal 2013, which begins on September 30, 2012. The repurchase program is expected to be executed over three years, with the primary objective of neutralizing the impact of dilution from future employee equity grants and employee stock purchase programs. “We have used some of our cash to make great investments in our business through increased research and development, acquisitions, new retail store openings, strategic prepayments and capital expenditures in our supply chain, and building out our infrastructure. You’ll see more of all of these in the future,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “Even with these investments, we can maintain a war chest for strategic opportunities and have plenty of cash to run our business. So we are going to initiate a dividend and share repurchase program.”

June 2012: Apple’s Mac Pro Server is upgraded to an Intel Xeon 3.2 GHz Quad-Core processor with 8 GB of DDR3 RAM.

June 11, 2012: Apple unveils an all new 15-inch MacBook Pro featuring a Retina display, all flash storage and quad-core processors in a radically thin and light design. Measuring a mere 0.71 inches and weighing 4.46 pounds, the completely redesigned MacBook Pro sets a new standard in performance and portability for pro users. The new MacBook Pro Retina display is the world’s highest resolution notebook display with over 5 million pixels, 3 million more than an HD television. At 220 pixels-per-inch, the Retina display’s pixel density is so high the human eye cannot distinguish individual pixels from a normal viewing distance, so text and graphics look incredibly sharp. The Retina display uses IPS technology for a 178-degree wide viewing angle, and has 75 percent less reflection and 29 percent higher contrast than the previous generation.

June 11, 2012: Apple updates MacBook Air with the latest Intel Core processors, faster graphics and flash storage that is up to twice as fast as the previous generation. MacBook Air is the ultimate everyday notebook, and with new lower prices it is more affordable than ever. The current generation 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Pro have also been updated with the latest Intel Core processors and powerful discrete graphics from NVIDIA. Apple’s popular AirPort Express has been redesigned to include features previously available only in AirPort Extreme.

June 11, 2012: Apple announces that OS X Mountain Lion, the ninth major release of this desktop operating system, will be available in July as a download from the Mac App Store. Mountain Lion introduces more than 200 innovative features including the all new Messages app, Notification Center, system-wide Sharing, Facebook integration, Dictation, Power Nap, AirPlay Mirroring, Game Center and the enhanced security of Gatekeeper. With iCloud built into the foundation of OS X, Mountain Lion makes it easier than ever to keep your content up to date across all your devices.

June 11, 2012: Apple previews iOS 6, introducing over 200 new features to the world’s most advanced mobile operating system, and released a beta version to iOS Developer Program members. iOS 6 will be available to iPhone, iPad and iPod touch users this fall as a free software update. New iOS 6 features include: an all new Maps app with Apple-designed cartography, turn-by-turn navigation and an amazing new Flyover view; new Siri features, including support for more languages, easy access to sports scores, restaurant recommendations and movie listings; Facebook integration for Contacts and Calendar, with the ability to post directly from Notification Center, Siri and Facebook-enabled apps like Photos, Safari and Maps; Shared Photo Streams via iCloud; and Passbook, the simplest way to get all the passes in one place.

June 30, 2012: MobileMe is discontinued, with anyone who had an account before the unveiling of iCloud having their MobileMe service extended to that date, free of charge.

July 30, 2012: Apple announces that downloads of OS X Mountain Lion have exceeded three million in four days, making it the most successful OS X release in Apple’s history. With more than 200 innovative new features, Mountain Lion is the ninth major release of the world’s most advanced desktop operating system and is available through the Mac App Store as an upgrade to Lion or Snow Leopard users for $19.99. Mountain Lion features include the all new Messages app, Notification Center, system-wide Sharing, Facebook integration, Dictation, AirPlay Mirroring and Game Center. iCloud integration makes it easy to set up your Mail, Contacts, Calendar, Messages, Reminders and Notes, and keep everything, including iWork documents, up to date across all your devices.

August 2012: Apple adds Hulu Plus integration to Apple TV.

August 27, 2012: Apple announces that Craig Federighi, Apple’s vice president of Mac Software Engineering, and Dan Riccio, Apple’s vice president of Hardware Engineering, have been promoted to senior vice presidents. Federighi and Riccio will report to Apple CEO Tim Cook and serve on Apple’s executive management team. Bob Mansfield, who announced his retirement in June, will remain at Apple. Mansfield will work on future products, reporting to Tim Cook. As senior vice president of Mac Software Engineering, Federighi will continue to be responsible for the development of Mac OS X and Apple’s common operating system engineering teams. Federighi worked at NeXT, followed by Apple, and then spent a decade at Ariba where he held several roles including vice president of Internet Services and chief technology officer. He returned to Apple in 2009 to lead Mac OS X engineering. Federighi holds a Master of Science degree in Computer Science and a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley. Riccio, as senior vice president of Hardware Engineering, will lead the Mac, iPhone, iPad and iPod engineering teams. He has been instrumental in all of Apple’s iPad products since the first generation iPad. Riccio joined Apple in 1998 as vice president of Product Design and has been a key contributor to most of Apple’s hardware over his career. Dan earned a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 1986.

September 12, 2012: Apple announces the new iTunes for Mac and PC featuring a completely redesigned player, seamless integration with iCloud, and a new look. The new iTunes is coming in October and will feature a simpler and cleaner interface that keeps the favorite iTunes content at the forefront. With iCloud integration, music, movie and TV purchases made on any of the connected iOS devices or computers is conveniently displayed in the user’s iTunes library on their Mac or PC, available anytime. The redesigned iTunes Store, App Store and iBookstore have been rethought to make buying the favorite content on iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Mac or PC simpler than ever.

September 12, 2012: Apple introduces the new lineup of its music players including the all-new iPod touch and reinvented iPod nano. The new iPod touch is the thinnest iPod touch ever and features a 4-inch Retina display; a 5 megapixel iSight camera with 1080p HD video recording; Apple’s A5 chip; Siri, the intelligent assistant; and iOS 6. The new iPod touch comes in a new ultra-thin and light anodized aluminum design, and for the first time ever, iPod touch comes in five colors. The new iPod nano is the thinnest iPod ever featuring a 2.5-inch Multi-Touch display; convenient navigation buttons; built-in Bluetooth for wireless listening; and the new iPod nano comes in seven new colors.

September 12, 2012: Apple announces iPhone 5, the thinnest and lightest iPhone ever, completely redesigned to feature a new 4-inch Retina display; an Apple-designed A6 chip for fast performance; and ultrafast wireless technology – all while delivering even better battery life. iPhone 5 comes with iOS 6, an operating system with over 200 new features including: the all new Maps app with Apple-designed cartography and turn-by-turn navigation; Facebook integration; Passbook organization; and even more Siri features and languages. iPhone 5 is the thinnest smartphone in the world, with a 7.6 mm anodized aluminum body that is 18 percent thinner and 20 percent lighter than iPhone 4S. iPhone 5 combines an anodized aluminum body with diamond cut chambered edges and glass inlays for a truly incredible fit and finish. The new 4-inch Retina display on iPhone 5 delivers even more pixels than iPhone 4S, making the Retina display even better. By making the screen taller, not wider, iPhone 5 is just as easy to use with one hand so users can tap, type and scroll the same way they always have, while enjoying even more of the content including amazing apps optimized for the larger Retina display, widescreen HD video, a full five days of the Calendar and more of every web page. iPhone 5 supports ultrafast wireless standards including LTE and DC-HSDPA, so users can browse, download and stream content faster. To support the latest LTE technology, Apple has pioneered a single-radio LTE solution that provides fast speeds while fitting perfectly into the remarkably thin design. iPhone 5 features dual-band 802.11n Wi-Fi support for a wireless experience up to 150 Mbps.

September 24, 2012: Apple announces it has sold over five million of its new iPhone 5, just three days after its launch on September 21, and more than 100 million iOS devices have been updated with iOS 6. iPhone 5 is available in the US, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and the UK, and will be available in 22 more countries on September 28 and more than 100 countries by the end of the year. Demand for iPhone 5 exceeded the initial supply and while the majority of pre-orders have been shipped to customers, many are scheduled to be shipped in October.

October 23, 2012: Apple unveils a completely new iMac with a new design, display with reduced reflection, and faster processors. With third generation faster Intel quad-core processors Intel Core i5 and i7 Ivy Bridge), powerful NVIDIA graphics and an innovative new storage option called Apple Fusion Drive, the new iMac is the most advanced desktop Apple has ever made. A new iMac will be available in November (21.5-inch version) and in December (27-inch version) with a substantially thinner edge, updates to the ports, but with the same overall depth (stand depth: 8 inches (20.3 cm). To reduce the edge, the SuperDrive was removed on these iMacs.

October 23, 2012: Apple introduces an all-new version of its popular 13-inch MacBook Pro featuring a Retina display and all flash storage in a new compact design. At a mere 0.75 inches and 3.57 pounds, the 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display is 20 percent thinner and almost a pound lighter than the current 13-inch MacBook Pro.

October 23, 2012: Apple introduces iPad mini, a new iPad design that is 23 percent thinner and 53 percent lighter than the third generation iPad. The new iPad mini features a 7.9-inch Multi-Touch display, FaceTime HD and iSight cameras, ultrafast wireless performance and 10 hours of battery life―every inch an iPad, yet in a design you can hold in one hand. Apple also announces the fourth generation iPad featuring a 9.7-inch Retina display, new Apple-designed A6X chip, FaceTime HD camera and ultrafast wireless performance. Both iPad mini and fourth generation iPad come with iOS 6, the world’s most advanced mobile operating system with over 200 new features. Users can run more than 275,000 apps designed specifically for iPad, which is as thin as a pencil and as light as a pad of paper, yet packs a fast A5 chip, FaceTime HD and 5 megapixel iSight cameras and ultrafast wireless.

October 29, 2012: Apple announces executive management changes that will encourage even more collaboration between the Company’s world-class hardware, software and services teams. As part of these changes, Jony Ive, Bob Mansfield, Eddy Cue and Craig Federighi will add more responsibilities to their roles. Apple also announced that Scott Forstall will be leaving Apple next year and will serve as an advisor to CEO Tim Cook in the interim. “We are in one of the most prolific periods of innovation and new products in Apple’s history,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “The amazing products that we’ve introduced in September and October, iPhone 5, iOS 6, iPad mini, iPad, iMac, MacBook Pro, iPod touch, iPod nano and many of our applications, could only have been created at Apple and are the direct result of our relentless focus on tightly integrating world-class hardware, software and services.”

November 5, 2012: Apple announces it has sold three million iPads in just three days since the launch of its new iPad mini and fourth generation iPad – double the previous first weekend milestone of 1.5 million Wi-Fi only models sold for the third generation iPad in March. The Wi-Fi + Cellular versions of both iPad mini and fourth generation iPad will ship in a few weeks in the US and in many more countries later this year. “Customers around the world love the new iPad mini and fourth generation iPad,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “We set a new launch weekend record and practically sold out of iPad minis. We’re working hard to build more quickly to meet the incredible demand.”

November 10, 2012: HTC and Apple have reached a global settlement that includes the dismissal of all current lawsuits and a ten-year license agreement. The license extends to current and future patents held by both parties. The terms of the settlement are confidential. “HTC is pleased to have resolved its dispute with Apple, so HTC can focus on innovation instead of litigation,” said Peter Chou, CEO of HTC. “We are glad to have reached a settlement with HTC,” said Tim Cook, CEO of Apple. “We will continue to stay laser focused on product innovation.”

November 27, 2012: Apple announces the all-new iMac will be available on Friday, November 30. Featuring a new design, a display with reduced reflection, faster processors and a new storage option called Fusion Drive, the new iMac is the most advanced desktop Apple has ever made. The 21.5-inch iMac will be available through the Apple Online Store, Apple’s retail stores and select Apple Authorized Resellers. The 27-inch iMac will be available for order through the Apple Online Store and will begin shipping in December. Redesigned from the inside out, the new iMac packs high performance technology into an aluminum and glass enclosure that measures just 5 mm thin at its edge and features a reengineered display that reduces reflection by 75 percent. The new iMac includes 8GB of 1600 MHz memory, a 1TB hard drive, third generation quad-core Intel Core i5 processors that can be upgraded to Core i7, and the latest NVIDIA GeForce graphics processors that deliver up to 60 percent faster performance. Fusion Drive is an innovative new storage option that gives customers the performance of flash and the capacity of a hard drive by combining 128GB of flash with a standard hard drive to create a single storage volume that intelligently manages files to optimize read and write performance.

November 30, 2012: As promised on November 27, the Apple iMac 21.5-inch, an all-in-one Macintosh desktop computer, is released.

December 17, 2012: Apple announces it has sold over two million of its new iPhone 5 in China, just three days after its launch on December 14. iPhone 5 will be available in more than 100 countries by the end of December, making it the fastest iPhone rollout ever. “Customer response to iPhone 5 in China has been incredible, setting a new record with the best first weekend sales ever in China,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “China is a very important market for us and customers there cannot wait to get their hands on Apple products.”

December 2012: The Apple iMac 27 inch (69 cm) all-in-one Macintosh desktop computer is released.

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