Steve Jobs: IBM's Boy Wonder

So what if Steve Jobs had been more of a corporate type, gone to work for IBM and his ideas had been accepted by the company? How would IBM have handled the Apple II or the MacIntosh? And what would Jobs be like as an eventual boss?

WestVirginiaRebel said:

So what if Steve Jobs had been more of a corporate type, gone to work for IBM and his ideas had been accepted by the company? How would IBM have handled the Apple II or the MacIntosh? And what would Jobs be like as an eventual boss?

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IBM? IBM!?!?! the mind boggles. He'd probably be fired six months into his job. They'd NEVER do an Apple-type project. There's a reason that Jobs and Woz produced their first products in a garage(literally) - even HP, which was far more innovative at the time wasn't prepared to support them in their project.

IBM - Remember these are the days when 'clean shaven white guy in black suit and tie' = 1) Mormon Missionary, 2) FBI agent 3) IBM employee.

It wasn't until Apple and the various CP/M machines took off that IBM started its PC division.

For IBM to go to personal computers in the mid-seventies, it would take a BIG POD within IBM. Not impossible, but unlikely. IBM would continue to market the mainframe as their staple for business, government and education.

Now could Jobs have have had a chance with Texas Instruments? The early Apple computer concept could be viewed as an extension of the portable calculators TI was already marketing with great success.