Good prognosis for Apple's Jobs but questions

AFP.com
By Chris Lefkow, Agence France-Presse

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The prognosis for Apple chief executive Steve Jobs is "excellent" following his liver transplant, according to his doctors, but the company's handling of his health issues is raising questions.
Corporate governance experts and others are divided on whether Apple has fully met its obligations to shareholders in dealing with the health of Jobs, the visionary behind the Macintosh computer, the iPod and the iPhone.
A Tennessee hospital which performed the procedure confirmed late Tuesday that Jobs had received a liver transplant and said he was "the sickest patient on the waiting list at the time a donor organ became available."
It said Jobs was "now recovering well and has an excellent prognosis."
Apple has not directly released any information about Jobs' health since he went on a leave of absence for medical reasons in January except to state repeatedly that he would be returning to work at the end of June as planned.
With the June 30 deadline fast approaching, the Wall Street Journal reported over the weekend that the 54-year-old Jobs, who was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2004, had undergone a liver transplant two months ago.
Questions about Jobs' health have resurfaced periodically since the cancer diagnosis and have been the subject of much debate over the obligations the Apple board of directors has to its shareholders.
"You can generate a lively discussion as to what the law currently is," said Columbia University professor John Coffee, who likened Jobs' standing at Apple to that of other iconic company founders such as Walt Disney and Henry Ford.
"The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has failed to give clear and adequate guidance," said Coffee, who specializes in corporate governance and securities law.
He said "most securities lawyers would think that there is some point at which the health of the CEO becomes material information that the company has to disclose.
"But the SEC has said nothing more than that you can't make false statements," Coffee said Billionaire Warren Buffett, chief executive of investment firm Berkshire Hathaway, told CNBC television that Apple should be more forthcoming.
"If I have any serious illness or something coming up of an important nature, an operation or anything like that, I think the thing to do is just tell the American, the Berkshire shareholders about it," he said.
"Some people might think I'm important to the company," Buffett said.
"Certainly Steve Jobs is important to Apple. It's a material fact. Whether he is facing serious surgery or not is a material fact."
Charles Elson, director of the Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at the University of Delaware, said he did not believe Apple was obliged to disclose information about Jobs' health until he was back on the job.
"When he returns, it's probably helpful for Apple to issue a statement as to his condition, what happened in the interim several months," he said.
"I think transparency would suggest that that's the best policy."
Elson also said the situation with Jobs, who returned to Apple in 1997 after a 12-year absence to turn around the flagging tech giant, is extraordinary.
"It's unusual that the CEO's health is so closely linked to the company's valuation," he said.
Paul Lapides, director of the Corporate Governance Center at Kennesaw State University, said he believed Apple's disclosure has been "more than adequate."
Jobs may be the "Madonna of the tech business," Lapides said, but 'people who believe the company is run by one person, and without his leadership and creative genius there is no company, should factor that into their decision to own the stock at all."
Elson and others said Apple should also probably prepare a succession plan in the event Jobs may have to step aside.
"You would hope that down the road the company would come up with a succession plan where this wouldn't become such an issue," Elson said.
Silicon Valley technology analyst Rob Enderle said this presents Apple's board of directors with a dilemma.
Enderle said Jobs appears to be someone who "believes very strongly that once you leave your career it's just a matter of time before you die.'
"He's just had two relatively close life-threatening experiences," Enderle said, but has not demonstrated any "willingness to actually name a successor."
"I don't envy the board," Enderle said.
"They're probably between a rock and a hard place on this one."