On September 16, 1997, Apple announced that co-founder Steve Jobs would step in as interim CEO following the ouster of Gil Amelio. At the time, the company was hemorrhaging cash, weighed down by a convoluted product matrix, and famously mere months away from insolvency. While an 'interim' appointment often signals a timid placeholder, Jobs leveraged the ambiguity to stage the most consequential corporate pivot in modern tech history. He ruthlessly slashed side projects—including the beloved Newton PDA—to refocus the company on a stripped-down grid of consumer and professional hardware. Within a year, the candy-colored iMac G3 debuted, returning Apple to profitability and establishing the design-first philosophy that would ultimately spawn the iPod, iPhone, and the world's most valuable tech enterprise.