Home » Santa Clarita News » Arif Halaby - Total Financial Solutions » KHTS AM-1220 Talks To Former Apple CEO, President Of Pepsi John Sculley

KHTS AM-1220 Talks To Former Apple CEO, President Of Pepsi John Sculley

Former Apple CEO and former President of Pepsi-Cola Company, John Sculley, talked with KHTS AM-1220’s Total Financial Solutions, Inc. Safer Money Hour on Tuesday about what it takes to create a business.


Sponsored Articles


Don’t miss a thing. Get breaking Santa Clarita news alerts delivered right to your inbox.

John Sculley was interviewed by Arif Halaby, owner of Total Financial Solutions on their weekly program, Safer Money Hour.

“When I first met Steve Jobs, back in 1982, I didn’t know much about personal computers, so I was actually using Apple at that time but it was a pretty small, unknown industry in a strange place called Silicon Valley that most people in the world have never heard of,” said Sculley. “Steve Jobs and Bill Gates both had a very big vision, they believed they were going to change the world. I was quizzical, if not skeptical, when I first met them and heard that but obviously we know they were incredibly preciant and they really did see the future and it did happen.”

Technology can basically solve any problem once it focuses on what the problem is, Sculley said.

“(Jobs and Edwin Land, the inventor of the Polaroid camera), really saw their role as looking at what does humankind need,” Sculley said.

Sculley described how Gates and Jobs had a vision about how personal computers were going to change the world.

“They put it in the context of what they called a ‘noble cause,’ and that’s a really good piece of advice to entrepreneurs. It isn’t just about how you make money, it’s about how do you solve really big, important problems for customers and even for humankind,” said Sculley. “Most cases you don’t have a noble cause, most new companies aren’t successful, you have to be a risk taker, you have to be willing to make mistakes and learn from those mistakes and try again.”

Big brands are being built in much less time now, typically 18 months to two years, said Scully.

“Because of social media, the word gets out because customers tell other customers and they tell other customers,” said Sculley. “(Some businesses are not) using much, if any, advertising to be able to get their messages out and they get to large numbers of people and it’s basically solving big customer problems.”

Sculley described the Uber service as a perfect example of how social media gets the word out.

Scully is in the process of introducing a new company which will launch in Silicon Valley in the third week of August.

“It’s not a company where we’re going to sell products in the United States, it’s for countries, particularly in the developing market, where people cannot afford the prices that they pay for a smartphone in the U.S. but where they have aspirations to be able to have a smartphone,” said Sculley. “We are designing a product called ‘Obi World Phone’ which will be far, far cheaper than any of the smartphones that are sold in the U.S.”

Sculley also wrote a book that was released in October 2014 called Moonshot! The book “will teach you to have the upper hand in any business,” according to the book description.

The book can be purchased here.

“I don’t have any interest in leaving a business legacy. My sense is that you try to pass on what you know to other people and you can do that best by writing stories, by talking to people or mentoring people,” said Sculley. “Stories are the best way of communicating… I’m a big believer in telling stories about real things and lessons learned, particularly mistakes because you learn most from your mistakes, not from your successes.”

Safer Money Hour comes on every Tuesday from 12 – 2 p.m. on KHTS AM-1220. Halaby and associates from Total Financial Solutions offer tips and guidance for dealing with today’s ever-changing financial needs on the program.

Do you have a news tip? Call us at (661) 298-1220, or drop us a line at community@hometownstation.com.

KHTS AM 1220 - Santa Clarita Radio

KHTS AM-1220 Talks To Former Apple CEO, President Of Pepsi John Sculley

2 comments

  1. Yes, John’s Newton was a kind of smartphone in the making but years ahead in time.

    Well, I am really keen to see if John’s Obi Worldphone could become his ‘Moonshot’, may be not quite that in the strict sense of the term as it is understood in the Silicon Valley, but a billion-dollar business nevertheless.

    Looking forward to see Obi Worldphone and what it does to the world.

  2. Wasn’t Sculley the one that canned Steve Jobs? If so, then I dare to claim Jobs did more for business and economy than Sculley ever did at Pepsi or Apple…

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

About Heather Harbin

Heather grew up in the Santa Clarita Valley and graduated from West Ranch High School in 2012. She recently graduated from College of the Canyons with an Associate's Degree in New Media Journalism. She was involved in College of the Canyons' "Cougar News" for two years, where she became the senior producer. She will be studying for her Bachelor's Degree at Cal State Northridge in the spring. Heather became a staff writer at KHTS AM-1220 following her internship in the newsroom. She has been writing news and feature articles for the KHTS website since May 2015.