london – Jeff Jones The Beatles’ Apple Corps Ltd announced (October 21) that he will step down as chief executive after 17 years in the role.
Apple Corps Ltd was founded by the Beatles in 1968 to control the band’s interests in music, film, publishing and other fields. From 1968 to 2007, the chief executive position was held by Neil Aspinall, the band’s long-time publicist.
Jones joined the team in 2007 and previously served as executive vice president at Sony/BMG, where he worked on repackaging classic works by artists such as Miles Davis.
As CEO of Apple, Jones led a number of projects at the company, including launching the band’s website and being the first to make the Beatles’ digital music available on iTunes in 2010.
He also collaborated with video game producer Harmonix on a Beatles game rock band Games and the company’s 18-year partnership with Cirque du Soleil The Beatles: Love Stage performances end in July 2024.
Jones served as executive producer on several filming projects, such as Ron Howard’s documentary The Beatles: Eight Days a Week – The Touring Years and Peter Jackson’s trilogy return series, to be released on Disney+ in 2021.
His work includes remastering and repackaging several of the band’s iconic albums, including white photo albumand became part of the licensing decision in 2012 revolver The track “Tomorrow Never Knows” appears on the AMC show mad Men. It was the first time any of their tracks had been licensed for US television, and it reportedly cost the producers around $250,000, five times the typical cost.
Jones’ recent projects include the release of the Beatles’ final song “Now and Then” in 2023 with the help of machine-assisted learning. He serves as an executive producer on the upcoming film The Beatles ’64 The documentary, produced by Martin Scorsese and directed by David Tedeschi, is scheduled to be released in November.
“The entire Apple family wishes Jeff Jones well and expresses our sincere gratitude for his valuable contributions to the company and the Beatles,” Apple wrote in a statement.
