Mark Foster has resigned as Apple’s head of PowerBook development efforts, his responsibilities will be handled by Glen Miranker from the desktop systems engineering department. The move is believed to be a forced resignation because of conflicts between Foster and Apple’s senior vice president of hardware engineering Jon Rubinstein.
According to a source intimate with the details of the shakeup, Foster defection was a change from the Wednesday lunchroom chat, that almost resulted in Rubinstein’s leaving Apple in disgust. First hand reports indicate that all of the players were dividing the pie, saving face, and reorganizing. It could even be different on Monday.
It remains to be seen how the move will impact PowerBooks, but it can’t be a good thing. We can only hope that Rubinstein stays on board and that Miranker will be able to remedy the company’s recent PowerBook production and forecasting problems before the launch of P1 next month.
