Katie Cotton, who led Apple’s public relations in the Steve Jobs era for over 20 years, died on Thursday, April 6. Her obituary says passed peacefully “surrounded by family and close friends.”
She’ll be missed. Katie was always very kind and helpful to me (even when she couldn’t reveal anything), which hasn’t always been the case with Apple’s PR folks. As I’ve been covering Apple for almost 30 years, Katie was the PR person with whom I’ve had the most dealings over the years.
Back in 2014, Cotton told the press the decision to leave Apple would be one of the hardest of her career: “This is hard for me,” she said. “Apple is a part of my heart.” The executive said she wanted to “spend time with her children for some time.”
Apple said in a statement to Bloomberg that the company is “deeply saddened by Katie’s passing.” The statement mentions that Cotton “was an extraordinary person and she made countless contributions over the course of her two-decade career at Apple” and that the thoughts of the people working at the company “are with her loved ones and everyone who had the opportunity to work with her.”
