Today Steve Jobs Would Have Turned 70. What Would He Make of Apple Now?

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Throughout my varied career as a Product Design graduate, Technology Salesman and Design educator, one person I always looked up to was Steve Jobs. With an uncanny ability to predict what people would want before they even knew it themselves and a sharp eye for design, his return to Apple took them from begging Microsoft for a loan to reshaping the very fabric of human society. He wasn’t a perfect man but the modern world owes him a debt of gratitude it can never repay. Sadly taken from the world in 2011 aged 56, this week would have been his 70th birthday.

He famously told his stewards not to ask what he would have done but to trust in their own ideas. I often ponder on what Steve might have made of the way Apple turned out, though. What would he have to say about the way smartphones have changed the world? Would he like the new HQ? How would he have reacted to competitors ideas? And would he have pulled any punches on the way the world turned out? I imagine the first thing would have been what to do with all that loot.

In 2011 Apple’s market valuation was close to $300bn. Riding high on the launch of the 2nd generation iPad, this was a 30% rise on 2010 alone and as you might imagine represented a shedload of money. Leaving the keys to Apple with Operations Manager Tim Cook, Apple are now worth…