Apple Spends Nearly $700,000 On Tim Cook’s Security
Tim Cook is the CEO of the most valuable brand in the world, so naturally he’s an important man. Patently Apple noticed the price of Mr. Cook’s security in a report filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The report listed amounts that were given to Cook’s account throughout last year.
“(i) the Company’s contributions to Mr Cook’s account under its 401(k) plan in the amount of $15,600; (ii) Company-paid term life insurance premiums in the amount of $2,520; (iii) vacation cash-out in the amount of $56,923; and (iv) security expenses in the amount of $699,133.”
The report noted that Mr. Cook’s security was obviously very important to the company.
“The Company generally does not provide perquisites to its officers that are not available to employees generally. Although the Company does not consider it to be a perquisite for his benefit, the Company provides home and personal security for Mr Cook because his personal safety and security are of the utmost importance to the Company and its shareholders.”
While $700,000 may seem like an extreme amount to spend on security, other companies actually pay more to protect their CEO’s. Jeff Bezos, who is the CEO of Amazon, has $1.6 million spent on his security. That’s significantly more than Cook, who most would see as a more public, known figure. While Bezos may not be very well-known to the average American, his reported worth is an estimated $28 billion. Regardless, the personal safety of any CEO of a very profitable company is usually extremely important to the company.
In Amazon’s 2014 SEC filing, the company vaguely explained what the $1.6 million was used for.
“represents the approximate aggregate incremental cost to Amazon.com of security arrangements for Mr. Bezos in addition to security arrangements provided at business facilities and for business travel. We believe that all company-incurred security costs are reasonable and necessary and for the company’s benefit.”
The former CEO of Oracle, Larry Ellison, was provided with $1.5 million in security during his time at the company. So, Tim Cook’s $700,000 is actually pretty conservative based on the security expenses of comparable business executives.
As Fortune reported, the average yearly security expense for the Fortune 100 companies was far less than Apple, Amazon, Oracle, and other top spenders. In 2013, the median yearly expense for security was just $28,618, which was down from $58,600 the previous year. As mentioned in the Fortune report, companies are only required to disclose their executive expenses if the cost is more than $10,000.
[Photo by Stephen Lam / Getty Images]
