How Did NeXT Get Steve Jobs Back Into Apple?

David Senra, reading Geoffrey Cain, says NeXT got Steve Jobs back into Apple because a product manager named Garrett Rice called Apple, and Jobs then showed up as a different founder.

Apple's chief executive, Gil Amelio, was watching the company bleed money and could no longer build its own operating system. Apple was ready to spend tens of millions of dollars on Be, which Rice heard as a pale imitation of NeXT. Rice asked why they did not just call Apple, and he left the pitch on the answering machine of Ellen, Apple's chief technology officer. He talked about the technology, not about Jobs. Ellen said she had not even thought of NeXT.

Jobs called Amelio, told him Be was the wrong choice, and was invited in. He pitched a strategy built around NeXT, then handed the demo to Avi, the head of software. Amelio saw a precise executive, not the self-absorbed founder he remembered. Jobs took the engineers' concerns seriously instead of waving them off. After a little more than an hour, the team had made a strong impression. Three days later Jobs asked Amelio to his house and opened at $12 a share, about $500 million. Amelio said $12 would not work and that he might get the board to $10.