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Steve Jobs: by the years

Steve Jobs: by the years

A biographical look at the life of Apple's guru

Steve Jobs lived a rich and extraordinary life. His achievements are myriad; his legacy massive. This biography summarises a life that will be spoken of for decades to come.

1955 - Born on February 24 in Los Altos, California, to Joanne Simpson and a Middle Eastern father (name not known).

1955 - Adopted from infancy by Paul and Clara Jobs in San Francisco. Moves to Mountain View, California, five months later.

1969 - Offered a summer job at Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP) by William Hewlett.

1971 - Meets Steve Wozniak; the two later found Apple Computer Inc.

1972 - Graduates from Homestead High School in Los Altos.

1972 - Registers in Reed College, Portland, Oregon, and drops out after one semester.

1974 - Joins Atari Inc. as a technician.

1975 - Starts attending meetings of the "Homebrew Computer Club," which discussed home computers.

1976 - Jobs and Wozniak raise US$1,750 and build their first marketable table-top computer, the Apple I.

1976 - Founds Apple Computer Company with Wozniak and Ronald Wayne. Wayne sells his stake two weeks later.

1976 - Launches Apple I for $666.66, the first single-board computer with a video interface and an onboard Read Only Memory (ROM) that told the machine how to load programs from an external source

1977 - Apple incorporated as a Apple Computer Inc. and the new company buys out the original partnership.

1977 - Apple launches Apple II, the world's first widely-used personal computer.

1978 - Has first child, Lisa Nicole, with Chris-Ann.

1979 - Development of Macintosh starts.

1980 - Apple III launched.

1980 - Apple goes public, share price jumps from $22 to $29 on the first day of trading.

1981 - Jobs involves himself in Macintosh development.

1983 - Recruits John Sculley as Apple president and chief executive officer.

1983 - Announces "Lisa", the first mouse-controlled computer. Fails in the marketplace.

1984 - Apple launches Macintosh with a splashy ad campaign on Super Bowl Sunday.

1985 - Wins National Technology Medal from U.S. President Ronald Reagan

1985 - Jobs ousted from Apple after boardroom struggle with Sculley. Jobs resigns and takes five Apple employees with him

1985 - Founds Next Inc. to develop computer hardware and software. Company later renamed to Next Computer Inc.

1986 - Buys Pixar from George Lucas for less than $10 million. Company later renamed to Pixar Animation Studios.

1989 - Next launches $6,500 NeXT Computer, also known as The Cube. It comes with a monochrome monitor, but fails in the marketplace.

1989 - Pixar wins Academy Award for animated feature "Tin Toy".

1991 - Marries current wife Laurene Powell, has three children with her over the years.

1992 - Next releases NEXTSTEP operating system for Intel Corp.'s 486 processors. It fails in the wake of competition from Microsoft Corp.'s Windows and IBM Corp.'s OS/2.

1993 - Next shuts hardware division, shifts focus to software.

1995 - Pixar's Toy Story highest grossing film that year.

1996 - Apple acquires Next Computer for $427 million in cash and Apple stock, Jobs becomes advisor to Apple Chairman Gilbert F. Amelio.

1997 - Jobs becomes interim CEO and chairman of Apple Computer Inc., after Amelio is ousted. Jobs' salary is $1.

1998 - Apple releases the all-in-one iMac computer, which sells millions of units, financially reviving the company and boosting its share price by 400 percent. IMac wins the Gold Award from British Design and Art Direction. Vogue calls the iMac "one of Spring's hottest fashion statements," and Business Week says it is "one of the century's lasting images." Jobs wins a Chrysler Design Institute award for the iMac design.

1998 - Apple returns to profitability, records four profitable quarters in a row.

2000 - 'Interim' dropped from Jobs' title.

2001 - Launched next-generation operating system -- the Unix-based OS X, with subsequent upgrades over the years.

2001 - Apple makes first foray into consumer electronics market with launch of iPod, portable MP3 player. It sells more than 2 million units by 2004

2002 - Launches the flat-panel all-in-one personal computer iMac. It makes the cover of Time Magazine that year and wins numerous design awards

2003 - Jobs announces the iTunes Music Store, which sells encoded songs and albums.

2003 - Jobs launches the 64-bit PowerMac G5 personal computer.

2004 - The iPod Mini, a smaller version of the original iPod, is launched.

2004 - In February, Jobs terminates Pixar's highly successful alliance with The Walt Disney Co. for production and distribution of Pixar's animated films.

2004 - In August, Jobs is diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and undergoes surgery. He recovers and returns to work in September.

2004 - Under Jobs' stewardship, Apple reports its highest fourth-quarter revenue in almost a decade, assisted by the resurgence of its retail network and sales of the iPod music player. The revenue for the period ending Sept. 25 is $2.35 billion.

2005 - Apple uses its Worldwide Developers Conference to announce that it is moving from using IBM PowerPC processors in its computers to Intel processors.

2007 - Jobs announces the iPhone, the first smartphone without a keyboard, at Macworld Expo.

2008 - In late December Apple announces that Jobs will not deliver the keynote at the 2009 Macworld Expo nor will he attend the event. This immediate sparks speculation on his health. Apple also said that it will no longer participate in the show after 2009.

2009 - In early January Jobs revealed that his dramatic weight loss was caused by a hormone imbalance. At that time he said this condition would not hinder his abilities to function as CEO.

Around one week later Jobs said that he will take a leave of absence from Apple until June because his medical condition had changed. He did not disclose his ailment. COO Tim Cook will handle Apple's day-to-day operations during Jobs' recovery period. Apple said Jobs will be involved with major strategic decisions.

June 2009 - The Wall Street Journal reports that Jobs underwent a liver transplant. A Tennessee hospital later releases a statement confirming the operation.

June 2009 - Apple confirms that Jobs returned to work at the end of the month.

Page 2 features the narrative.

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