Apple Promotes Jeff Williams, Adds App Stores to Phil Schiller’s Responsibilities ⇥ apple.com

Everything I’ve heard about Jeff Williams paints him as Tim Cook’s Tim Cook, keeping a close eye on Apple’s supply chain. I didn’t realize that the company hadn’t had a COO since Cook was promoted to CEO, but now they do again.

This, though, is very intriguing:

With added responsibility for the App Store, Phil Schiller will focus on strategies to extend the ecosystem Apple customers have come to love when using their iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch and Apple TV. Phil now leads nearly all developer-related functions at Apple, in addition to his other marketing responsibilities including Worldwide Product Marketing, international marketing, education and business marketing.

App Store duties were previously Eddy Cue’s purview, as they’re part of Apple’s internet services. Placing their management under Schiller signals, to me, a realization that App Store issues should be grouped with the rest of Apple’s developer relations; they are dissimilar to cloud, media, and payment services. Schiller has a very good relationship with the Apple developer community, and I think — or, at least, hope — that this bodes well for the future of the App Stores.