The new Apple thinks different?

The latest Apple leadership changes set the stage for a new approach from the company on a range of issues, including international relations, the environment, and beyond. If great artists steal, great leaders reflect the spirit of their age. 

Apple’s current general counsel, Kate Adams, will leave late next year, following a transition to a new general counsel — Meta Chief Legal Officer Jennifer Newstead — in March 2026. Apple also announced that Lisa Jackson, vice president for environment, policy, and social initiatives, will retire in late January. 

The new faces

Newstead’s appointment is perhaps the biggest hint of the potential for change. She brings with her extensive experience in foreign policy and international affairs, both topics of major importance to Apple in the shifting sands of current global politics and alliances. She also served as a top lawyer in the first Trump administration before leaving that position to move to Meta. 

A second sign of change might be the departure of Jackson, who served as US Environmental Protection Agency head in the Obama administration. She has been instrumental in guiding Apple toward its oft-stated target to be completely carbon neutral by 2030. Apple CEO Tim Cook praised her for, “advocating for the best interests of our users on a myriad of topics, as well as advancing our values, from education and accessibility to privacy and security.”

What’s unusual here is that there doesn’t appear to be a clear succession path for this role, which seems odd given the depth of talent Apple already has within Jackson’s departments. Apple says Jackson’s Environment and Social Initiatives team will report to Apple’s Chief Operating Officer (COO), Sabih Khan, while work on government affairs will transition to Apple’s former general counsel, Kate Adams, for a while until it becomes part of Adams’ new domain.

Who will advocate now?

It is important not to read too much into this, but these leadership changes do make it easier to think there might be no one at Apple’s top table to advocate over some of the environment, social, and government affairs the company has regularly shown leadership in across the last decade. 

Newstead will have enough on her plate handling international regulators, particularly in Europe, while Apple’s COO will be more focused on manufacturing and supply – particularly around how Apple’s $600 billion investment in US manufacturing can boost US employment. 

That doesn’t mean Apple won’t hit its 2030 goals, but does suggest that those ambitions might take second place to operational concerns. (It is also notable that Cook praised Adams as having been an important advocate for Apple’s push for privacy. Will Newsom prize privacy as much?)

Given Apple’s recent warnings that meeting regulatory obligations in the EU will force it to remove privacy safeguards from products sold there, is the company preparing to give up that struggle? After all, if people continue to vote for authoritarian governments in different color shades, at what point must private enterprise concede state surveillance is what people want?

Apple’s new order

If nothing else, the changing of the guard strongly suggests that there is plenty at stake, and while Cook may now always be known for giving a lump of gold to a President to protect Apple’s shareholders, who knows what other compromises the company has had to make? Speculation Cook might himself retire also opens the gate to a new approach from company leadership. The complex political realities we face will inevitably be reflected across corporate boardrooms, eager to foster permanent growth for their shareholders.

None of this could be true, of course. But what is true is that while the departure of Alan Dye means Apple’s products might in the future work differently, Apple’s latest board-level leadership changes — coming mere months since COO Jeff Williams left the company — make it possible the company will think different, too. 

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