Tim Cook says he is not meddling with John Ternus, in his first interview since stepping down as Apple CEOTim Cook says he is not meddling with John Ternus, in his first interview since stepping down as Apple CEO

Tim Cook has said he is not interfering in John Ternus's running of Apple, in an interview with The Independent published on 8 October, his first since he stepped down as chief executive on 1 September.

The Independent's David Phelan spoke to Cook backstage at Apple Music Hall, inside Apple's UK headquarters at Battersea Power Station, on the second day of the first Apple x King's Trust Creative Labs workshops. Most of the interview is about that programme. The section on Ternus is short, and it is the first time Cook has spoken on the record about how the handover is working from his side.

What Cook said about John Ternus

Phelan raised the comments that a former chief executive staying inside the company is an unusual arrangement. Cook answered that he and Ternus have "an incredible level of trust" in each other, and that communication between them has to be frequent and substantial. Beyond that, he said, his own focus is worldwide policy: Apple's dealings with governments, where the company is trying to advocate for change. He said he helps Ternus in any way Ternus wants. "I'm not meddling. I'm not a meddler," he told Phelan.

Cook also returned to advice Steve Jobs once gave him, not to make a decision because it is what Jobs would have done. He said he had told Ternus the same thing: make the job his own and put his time where he adds the most value. Cook summed it up as "don't mimic me", adding that he had not mimicked Jobs either.

Why did Tim Cook step down before the iPhone Duo launch?

Phelan put it to Cook that many chief executives would have stayed for one more keynote to launch the iPhone Duo, Apple's first foldable iPhone, which goes on sale on 23 October. Cook said he "wanted John to have some wind at his back", and that at Apple that wind comes from the product cycle. As MacRumors points out, Ternus unveiled the Duo eight days after taking over.

Cook described the goal as "the best transition ever", a textbook case others could learn from. He said it had started years ago and that everything had gone almost exactly as he had pictured it.

How it fits what has already been reported

The Verge noted that Cook's advice matches what Ternus has reportedly told staff. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman reported on 4 October that Ternus, following Cook's advice, had said he would spend his time where he adds the most value, in the same report that said Ternus works in Apple's design studio several times a week. The Verge also points out that Cook is still a visible face of the company, and was recently photographed at a state dinner at the White House.

The Independent is the only source. MacRumors, 9to5Mac, The Verge and others all quote the same interview, so this is one account rather than several. Apple has added nothing to it.

Our take

The most informative line is not the denial but the job description. Worldwide policy and relations with governments is a large, concrete brief, and Cook is visibly doing it. On 6 October he was in Strasbourg, welcoming a Europe-wide child safety framework. A chairman with that much travel and that many regulators to see has less room to second-guess product decisions, which supports what he says better than the words themselves do.

"Not meddling" is what every departing chief executive who stays on as chairman says, and nobody outside can check it. What can be checked is whose name is on the decisions. So far the visible changes of the new era carry Ternus's: the cuts to Apple's program managers, the time in the design studio, and this week's reported reshuffle of the mergers and acquisitions team. If Cook were steering, we would expect less change, not more.

The timing answer deserves a closer look. Leaving before the biggest launch of the year means the iPhone Duo is Ternus's product on the record, whatever happens to it. If it sells, he gets the credit. If the hinge or supply goes wrong, he carries that too. APPDOOK's reading is that the wind-at-his-back line is honest about the benefit and quiet about the risk, which now sits with the new chief executive alone.

What the interview does not settle is how the two divide the work that sits between a chairman and a chief executive, such as investor relations and the largest partnerships. Ternus's first results call, on 2 November, is the first public test of that.