Yes, the marketing piece is hard to operationalize and a 'creative lead' who leaves can ruin it - unlike regular ops where a 'finely tuned machine' can run for a long time with just responsible leaders.

The new CMO is from Burberry, and I think she will keep things humming well.

Johnny Ive is still participating, so they have a design front established.

Engineers can think of cool new things.

So they have a lot of momentum.

But still ...

There was a time before Apple, there will be a time after Apple :) ...