#2 Tim Cook

Company:  Apple

We saw Apple grabbing all the attention in 2012 with some major headlines. It was a critical continuation for the 52 year old CEO Tim Cook post Steve Jobs death. In 2013, the device war will get stronger and Cook might have to battle with Google, which launched the Nexus tablet and Nexus Smartphone in 2012. Being one among the four runners-up for Time magazine’s ‘Person of the Year,’ to successful launches of the iPad Mini and IPhone 5, the highlight was with Apple’s stock hitting an all time high of $700 a share, up from $300 when jobs died in October 2011.

Apple sold 5 million IPhone sets at a stretch and 3 million iPad Mini sets within three days of its launch. However critics say that neither of them highlighted new innovations.

Now the New Year has some formidable tasks for Cook. This is seen with Samsung overtaking Apple, Microsoft’s approach towards a computing environment and the growing acceptance of Android smartphones. Cook has to scrutinize over all this keeping an eye on Microsoft stepping ahead.