Philip Houska Tony Fadell, co-founder of Nest Labs, which was bought by Google two years ago, was interviewed for VentureBeat interviewed by Dean Takashi and focused on the early days of the iPod music player, which changed the way the "portable" music industry was viewed once and for all. Based on this device, the first signs of the iPhone also began to emerge.
Fadell, who started at General Magic and worked his way up to Apple via Phillips, was in charge of a team that revolutionized music playback. But this fact was preceded by certain doubts.
“Look… You do it and I guarantee I'll use every marketing dollar I have. I'm sacrificing a Mac to make it happen," Fadell quoted Steve Jobs, who was very passionate about the then-emerging iPod, as saying. At the same time, Fadell believed that such a product could not break through.
“I told Jobs we could create anything. It is enough if he gives us enough money and time, but there was no guarantee that we would sell such a product at all. There was Sony, which had every audio category in its portfolio. I didn't believe we could do anything against such a company," admitted Fadell, who left Apple in late 2008.
[su_pullquote align=”right”]In the beginning it was just an iPod with a phone module.[/su_pullquote]
The iPod later emerged as the product that defined the wearable music device, but initially it faced some problems - only Mac owners bought it, as iTunes, the necessary synchronization and management application, was only for Apple computers.
"It took two and a half years. The first year was great. Every Mac owner bought an iPod, but at the time there weren't many users of this platform. Then there was a certain 'fight' with Jobs regarding the compatibility of Apple devices with PCs. ,Over my dead body! That will never happen! We need to sell Macs! That's going to be one of the reasons why people will buy Macs,' Jobs told me, making it clear that we're not just going to make an iPod for the PC.
"I opposed and I had enough people around me who stood behind me. I strongly told Jobs that even though the iPod costs $399, it is not really worth that much, because people have to buy a Mac for additional money to own it," revealed the plot between him and Jobs, the co-founder of the successful company Nest Labs, which manufactures, for example, thermostats. The then head of Microsoft, Bill Gates, also reacted to this dispute, who did not understand why Apple had originally made such a decision.
Jobs, Apple's CEO at the time, eventually relented and allowed PC users to use the necessary iTunes application for full iPod functionality. Which turned out to be a very good move as the sales of this revolutionary player increased noticeably. In addition, Apple became more widely known to people who did not know the company at all before the introduction of the iPod.
After some time, the success of the iPod was also reflected in the already inherent device of this company, the iPhone.
“In the beginning it was just an iPod with a phone module. It looked the same, but if the user wanted to select some numbers, he would have to do it via the rotary dial. And that wasn't the real thing. We knew it wasn't going to work, but Jobs motivated us enough to try everything," Fadell mentioned, adding that the whole process was seven or eight months of hard work before it finally came to fruition.
"We created a touch screen with Multi-Touch functionality. Then we needed a better operating system, which we created based on the combination of certain elements from the iPod and the Mac. We made the first version, which we immediately rejected and started working on a new one," Fadell recalled, adding that it took about three years to create a phone that was ready for sale.
