MW Apple, Best Buy and Lululemon's new CEOs signal a generational shift, as companies navigate a more chaotic world
By Bill Peters
In naming new CEOs, the companies have tapped executives with backgrounds that focus on digital transformation
Apple named John Ternus as its new CEO, replacing Tim Cook.
Apple, Best Buy and Lululemon Athletica all do business differently. But over the past week, they've had a common narrative: They've named new CEOs who will lead their efforts to navigate a more tumultuous and uncertain world.
Those appointments, analysts say, speak to each company's current difficulties as well as a broader changing of the guard, as they brace for an era of a more cautious consumers, artificial-intelligence upheaval, ongoing trade wars, and actual wars abroad that have mangled supply chains and driven up prices for essentials.
"There is a kind of generational shift, or maybe an era-change shift, going on longer term," John Challenger, CEO of career-services firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, said of the CEO changes at the three companies.
Staying ahead of AI and managing supply chains, he noted, were front and center. AI, he added, was already changing the way businesses work.
"I do believe that's putting new pressures on boards to find CEOs that are going to adapt to the new realities and figure out how to operate in this new era," Challenger said.
The changes started on Monday, when Apple $(AAPL)$ announced that John Ternus would take the reins from Tim Cook, who has led the iPhone maker for 15 years.
Then on Wednesday, Best Buy $(BBY)$ said Jason Bonfig would take over for Corie Barry, who had been CEO at the electronics retailer for seven years. And later that day Lululemon Athletica (LULU) tapped Nike $(NKE)$ veteran Heidi O'Neill as the yoga-wear giant's new CEO, following a search for a permanent replacement for Calvin McDonald, who started that job in 2018 and left earlier this year.
Jason Schloetzer, a business professor at Georgetown University, noted other tech-related similarities to the changes.
"I think the through line here is kind of even more of a move toward digital," he said. "All three appointments have a background that focuses on digital transformation."
New CEOs' biggest challenges
For Apple, the new CEO pick - a rare change at the top for the company - followed a 1,900% stock gain on Cook's watch and expert stewardship over the iPhone maker's production and shipping infrastructure, but questions about its AI development. For Best Buy and Lululemon, the changes came after the companies failed to keep investors happy following a surge in pandemic-era demand that drove their stocks to record or near-record levels.
Now, those executives will have to address a variety of challenges - namely, chip shortages and AI-related competition at at Apple and Best Buy, and style missteps at Lululemon.
Ken Mahoney, CEO of Mahoney Asset Management, told MarketWatch that Apple's leadership change did not appear to be driven by performance, but could help spark new ideas. However, some analysts believe that Apple has lagged its Big Tech rivals on AI development, following stumbles in its rollout of Apple Intelligence.
Meanwhile, the consumer-electronics world faces an acute memory-chip shortage, as AI-infrastructure demand gobbles up semiconductor supplies and thus threatens to drive up the price of things like smartphones and laptops. Any price increases would likely put further pressure on demand at store chains, as the electronics industry tries to regain its footing after the pandemic's digital boom dried up.
That shortage has implications for Bonfig, Best Buy's new CEO. The retailer has downplayed the shortage's impact, arguing that the product-replacement cycle and sales of items at a wide price range would help weather it. But UBS analysts have said how the chain handles leaner chip supplies would be a major focus for Wall Street.
Bonfig, who starts as CEO on Nov. 1, most recently oversaw the creation of Best Buy's online U.S. marketplace and the expansion of its ads business. Those areas, Best Buy has said, are essential to the company's growth.
He will step in after his predecessor, Barry, navigated Best Buy through the chaos of the pandemic. While the stock surged to a high of $138 in 2021, its value has been cut roughly in half since. On Friday, Best Buy shares were below where they traded when Barry became CEO.
Geek Squad has a geekier rival: AI
In previous years, when the economy got tougher, Best Buy could lean on its Geek Squad tech assistants to set itself apart from rivals.
But today, AI can also help with tech assistance, said Neil Saunders, a retail analyst at GlobalData. Walmart $(WMT)$ and Amazon.com (AMZN) have upped their game in electronics sales. More recently, Best Buy's stores have also left something to be desired, he noted.
"It was a place where you could go and look at innovative things, you could try them out - and honestly, the stores don't feel that way anymore," Saunders said. "They feel really flat. They feel a little bit depressing in some instances."
The narrative around Lululemon had been depressing in different ways leading up to the appointment of O'Neill, who takes the helm on on Sept. 8.
The company's popularity picked up over the prior decade on the back of workout wear with comfortable, high-quality stretch fabric and an attention to technical design. The at-home workout boom during the pandemic launched Lululemon's stock higher through 2021, followed by a peak in 2023.
But now, the company's share price, which stands at around $143, is at lows not seen since 2019. Competition from Vuroi and Alo Yoga has increased and weighed on sales. Saunders noted that Lululemon has also strayed from its core, now offering things like rugby shirts. Other analysts have remarked on Lululemon's lack of fashion cohesion.
William Blair analyst Sharon Zackfia said that over the past two years in the U.S., the time it has taken for Lululemon to bring products to market has grown longer - bloating to around 24 months, from less than a year when it went public in 2007.
The leisure side of Lululemon's business also hasn't held up as well; innovation in that business hasn't amounted to much more than new colors. More crucially, Zackfia believes company needs to get back to addressing the needs of the female consumers who made it popular in the first place.
Lululemon, in a release, said that O'Neill focused much of her 25-plus years at Nike working on product design, digital commerce and global market operations. But Lululemon's stock sold off sharply on the announcement, as analysts noted it was difficult to assess what role O'Neill might have had in Nike's current struggles of its own. Nike's stock closed earlier this month at a 12-year low.
"It's always tough with a company like Nike, where it's so big and the titles are frankly so big in leadership, to really know what to attribute to O'Neill," Zackfia said. "Our best insight is basically based on her LinkedIn right now."
-Bill Peters
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(END) Dow Jones Newswires
April 25, 2026 08:30 ET (12:30 GMT)
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