Apple TV+ is about art more than iPhone sales says CEO Cook

CEO Tim Cook during the WWDC 2025 ‘F1’ skit – Image Credit: Apple

The immense spending on Apple TV+ projects like “F1” is less about selling more iPhones to the public, and more about the art itself, according to CEO Tim Cook.

Apple TV+ is well known as a well-heeled video streaming service, with Apple losing over a billion dollars per year on it. The approach, which enables high-budget shows to be produced for the streaming platform, puts it at a par with others like Netflix, if not with the subscriber count.

The approach could be considered an extreme marketing exercise, trying to increase the sale of connected items like the iPhone and Macs. There’s also speculation that a success with “F1″”F1” could result in Apple securing the U.S. rights to the sport for the 2026 season.

To CEO Tim Cook in an interview with Variety promoting the “F1” movie, it’s about far more than that. To Cook, it’s all about the art.

Brand-worthy

In promoting the racing film, Cook insists that it is worthy of Apple’s brand.

“We cared about every detail,” he says, proposing that the camera makes the viewer feel like they’re in the car with the driver.

With “F1” being Apple’s biggest release, Cook sees it as a way to test how Apple can be influential to culture via a movie, than through its hardware products.

“To bring something like that to life would be authentic to the sport,” Cook adds, telling the story of ups and downs in racing.

At the same time, Cook wanted to bring things that are “uniquely Apple” to the movie, like its camera technology. Furthermore, it’s something that he plans for the entire company to support, down to the retail level.

Apple TV+ is for greatness

Discussing the creation of Apple TV+, Cook says that it an Apple Original Films are important because the company stands at the “intersection of technology and the liberal arts.” For Apple TV+ itself, Cook wants it to be the place where “great storytellers would tell their best stories.”

To do that, Apple decided that creating original content was the best foot forward. While Cook admits that buying a catalog of content would be a fast way to get up and running, he adds that Apple instead should pour its passion into the shows.

Apple’s role is that of a “toolmaker,” Cook believes, reviving the term that co-founder Steve Jobs used in his own description of the company from the 1980s. “We make tools for creative people to empower them to do things they couldn’t do before.”

After studying Hollywood for years before deciding to press on with Apple TV+, Cook insists that Apple wants to both tell great stories and to make it a great business too.

Never about the cost

The operation of Apple TV+ is viewed by outsiders as somewhat mystifying, in wondering how the content works to increase hardware sales. Cook believes that, while there are organic connections created as time marches on, it’s not about sales.

“I don’t have it in my mind that I’m going to sell more iPhones because of it,” Cook explains. “I don’t think about that at all. I think about it as a business.”

Just as it works to leverage Apple’s business with iPhones and services, Cook insists Apple is trying to do the same with Apple TV+.

In conclusion, Cook believes Apple is a company with relatively few products for its size. That allows the company to pour itself into each product, and that it will do TV and movies the same way.

To Cook, it’s about “staying true” to Apple’s push for innovation. If the company can do it while entertaining people at the same time, Cook offers “then we’re doing pretty good.”