{"id":21518,"date":"2021-01-06T02:44:00","date_gmt":"2021-01-06T06:44:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=21518"},"modified":"2021-01-11T19:12:08","modified_gmt":"2021-01-11T23:12:08","slug":"steve-jobs-and-pixar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/","title":{"rendered":"Steve Jobs and Pixar: The Company’s First 2 Decades"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What is the connection between Steve Jobs and Pixar<\/a>? How did the relationship between the company and Jobs evolve?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In February 1986, Steve Jobs purchased Pixar for $5 million. Steve Jobs and Pixar were connected until 2005, when the company was sold to Disney.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read on for more about Steve Jobs and Pixar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Steve Jobs and Pixar<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In 1985, Jobs was the director of Apple Computer Inc. and wanted to develop products that would shape the future of technology<\/a>. Catmull met with Jobs and showed him the technology they had created. Jobs, a notoriously assertive man, avoided small talk and asked big questions such as \u201cWhat are your long-term goals?\u201d and \u201cWhat can your tech do that other tech can\u2019t?\u201d Though Catmull and Smith were a bit uneasy because of Jobs’s forceful personality, they eventually agreed to the deal. After negotiations, Jobs purchased Pixar for $5 million in February 1986, and the company \u201cPixar\u201d was born.<\/strong> Steve Jobs and Pixar were then connected for two decades.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Abandoning Computer Sales<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Despite Catmull\u2019s best efforts, Pixar was still in the red. <\/strong>Though they had a fair amount of success as an animation studio (their early films earned them two Academy Award nominations and one win), they only managed to sell 300 computers. The sales didn\u2019t cover the cost of building and developing the hardware.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With this in mind, Catmull decided to stop selling hardware. <\/strong>The team was much more passionate about filmmaking, and removing the costs of creating hardware would save them significant amounts of money. The problem, however, was that they now had no source of significant income. The short films they were making may have garnered awards and praise, but they didn\u2019t bring in box office money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tensions Between Jobs and Catmull<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Between 1987-1991, tensions between Catmull and Jobs intensified.<\/strong> Jobs was frustrated with Catmull\u2019s inability to produce a profit, and Catmull was tired of Jobs’s demanding and pretentious attitude. Jobs, having sunk tens of millions into Pixar, tried to sell the animation studio three<\/em> times. <\/strong>Generous offers came from Microsoft, Alias, and Silicon Graphics, but Jobs never took the sale. Catmull believes this was because the offers made Jobs see the value of Pixar. For example, if Microsoft was willing to offer $90 million, Pixar must have significant value.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The End of the Pixar-Steve Jobs Relationship<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In 2005, Jobs told Catmull and Lasseter that he was considering selling Pixar to Disney. <\/strong>This shocked the Pixar leaders because, at the time, Pixar and Disney<\/a> had hit a rough patch. However, leadership at Disney had recently changed, and the new CEO, Bob Iger, wanted to bring Pixar back into the fold. Disney Animation had been struggling for years, and Iger believed that Catmull and Lasseter could reinvigorate the organization by leading both Pixar and Disney Animation. Iger assured them that Pixar would maintain its autonomy and its company culture<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ultimately, Jobs gave the decision to Catmull and Lasseter. During negotiations, Catmull drafted a lengthy list of demands that ensured Pixar\u2019s culture wouldn\u2019t be impacted after being bought by a massive entertainment studio such as Disney. These demands ranged from keeping a \u201cno assigned parking\u201d rule to ensuring that Pixar leadership could still distribute bonuses following box office success. In addition to these demands, Catmull insisted that Pixar remain separate from Disney Animation Studios with each company working on their own projects. Once these safeguards were established, Catmull and Lasseter agreed to sell Pixar to Disney.<\/strong> Steve Jobs and Pixar were no longer connected.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What is the connection between Steve Jobs and Pixar? How did the relationship between the company and Jobs evolve? In February 1986, Steve Jobs purchased Pixar for $5 million. Steve Jobs and Pixar were connected until 2005, when the company was sold to Disney. Read on for more about Steve Jobs and Pixar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":22679,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[45,39,33],"tags":[178],"class_list":["post-21518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-history","category-people","tag-creativity-inc","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"\nSteve Jobs and Pixar: The Company's First 2 Decades - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"What's the connection between Steve Jobs and Pixar? From 1986 to 2005, Jobs owned Pixar before selling it to Disney. Read more here.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Steve Jobs and Pixar: The Company's First 2 Decades\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"What's the connection between Steve Jobs and Pixar? From 1986 to 2005, Jobs owned Pixar before selling it to Disney. Read more here.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Shortform Books\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-01-06T06:44:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-01-11T23:12:08+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2560\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1708\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Rina Shah\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Rina Shah\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Rina Shah\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/d07435826f13a8f422d5d333dceac287\"},\"headline\":\"Steve Jobs and Pixar: The Company’s First 2 Decades\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-01-06T06:44:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-01-11T23:12:08+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/\"},\"wordCount\":591,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Creativity Inc.\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Business\",\"History\",\"People\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/\",\"name\":\"Steve Jobs and Pixar: The Company's First 2 Decades - Shortform Books\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-01-06T06:44:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-01-11T23:12:08+00:00\",\"description\":\"What's the connection between Steve Jobs and Pixar? From 1986 to 2005, Jobs owned Pixar before selling it to Disney. Read more here.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg\",\"width\":2560,\"height\":1708},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Steve Jobs and Pixar: The Company’s First 2 Decades\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Shortform Books\",\"description\":\"The World's Best Book Summaries\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Shortform Books\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png\",\"width\":500,\"height\":74,\"caption\":\"Shortform Books\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"}},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/d07435826f13a8f422d5d333dceac287\",\"name\":\"Rina Shah\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/560b3bc3d51625f9becff4fded992607b156f274aa36bc07f8a4285a1d72cdc8?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/560b3bc3d51625f9becff4fded992607b156f274aa36bc07f8a4285a1d72cdc8?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Rina Shah\"},\"description\":\"An avid reader for as long as she can remember, Rina\u2019s love for books began with The Boxcar Children. Her penchant for always having a book nearby has never faded, though her reading tastes have since evolved. Rina reads around 100 books every year, with a fairly even split between fiction and non-fiction. Her favorite genres are memoirs, public health, and locked room mysteries. As an attorney, Rina can\u2019t help analyzing and deconstructing arguments in any book she reads.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/author\/rina\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Steve Jobs and Pixar: The Company's First 2 Decades - Shortform Books","description":"What's the connection between Steve Jobs and Pixar? From 1986 to 2005, Jobs owned Pixar before selling it to Disney. Read more here.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Steve Jobs and Pixar: The Company's First 2 Decades","og_description":"What's the connection between Steve Jobs and Pixar? From 1986 to 2005, Jobs owned Pixar before selling it to Disney. Read more here.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/","og_site_name":"Shortform Books","article_published_time":"2021-01-06T06:44:00+00:00","article_modified_time":"2021-01-11T23:12:08+00:00","og_image":[{"width":2560,"height":1708,"url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Rina Shah","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Rina Shah","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/"},"author":{"name":"Rina Shah","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/d07435826f13a8f422d5d333dceac287"},"headline":"Steve Jobs and Pixar: The Company’s First 2 Decades","datePublished":"2021-01-06T06:44:00+00:00","dateModified":"2021-01-11T23:12:08+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/"},"wordCount":591,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg","keywords":["Creativity Inc."],"articleSection":["Business","History","People"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/","name":"Steve Jobs and Pixar: The Company's First 2 Decades - Shortform Books","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg","datePublished":"2021-01-06T06:44:00+00:00","dateModified":"2021-01-11T23:12:08+00:00","description":"What's the connection between Steve Jobs and Pixar? From 1986 to 2005, Jobs owned Pixar before selling it to Disney. Read more here.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg","width":2560,"height":1708},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/steve-jobs-and-pixar\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Steve Jobs and Pixar: The Company’s First 2 Decades"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/","name":"Shortform Books","description":"The World's Best Book Summaries","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"Shortform Books","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png","width":500,"height":74,"caption":"Shortform Books"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/d07435826f13a8f422d5d333dceac287","name":"Rina Shah","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/560b3bc3d51625f9becff4fded992607b156f274aa36bc07f8a4285a1d72cdc8?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/560b3bc3d51625f9becff4fded992607b156f274aa36bc07f8a4285a1d72cdc8?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Rina Shah"},"description":"An avid reader for as long as she can remember, Rina\u2019s love for books began with The Boxcar Children. Her penchant for always having a book nearby has never faded, though her reading tastes have since evolved. Rina reads around 100 books every year, with a fairly even split between fiction and non-fiction. Her favorite genres are memoirs, public health, and locked room mysteries. As an attorney, Rina can\u2019t help analyzing and deconstructing arguments in any book she reads.","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/author\/rina\/"}]}},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/steve-jobs-apple-biography-book-phone-scaled.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21518"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21518\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23644,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21518\/revisions\/23644"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}