Apple: Jobs to Take Medical Leave of Absence

http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2009/01/14/apple-jobs-to-take-medical-leave-of-absence/

by bootload • 18 years ago

159 106 18 years ago

blogs.wsj.com

augustus2• 18 years ago

Not good.

tlrobinson3• 18 years ago

It's certainly not good for Jobs that his health is declining, and may not be good for AAPL in the short term, but it gives Apple the opportunity to prove that Apple != Steve Jobs. If Apple can continue to kick ass for 6 months while he's gone, it indicates that Apple may do just fine once he's gone permanently.

Of course, 6 months may not be long enough to really tell. There's also the possibility that he really is dying and they're hiding it, or he simply plans to permanently retire, and they're just "easing" investors into the idea of an Apple without Steve Jobs. I hope neither is the case, especially the former.

jedc• 18 years ago

Completely agree. The truly big test for Apple would really come 12-18 months after Steve's departure, when the product development pipeline matures. If they're able to keep the same "magic" with or without Steve, then it proves that he built Apple's success into their culture.

augustus2• 18 years ago

I was only thinking of Jobs.

bootload4• 18 years ago

"... Apple CEO Steve Jobs today sent the following email to all Apple employees ..."

Don't see anything on the Apple pr site yet ~ http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2009/01/ So it's unconfirmed.

tlrobinson3• 18 years ago

I doubt the WSJ would publish a letter like this if it were unconfirmed.

bootload4• 18 years ago

"... I doubt the WSJ would publish a letter like this if it were unconfirmed. ..."

Email isn't the most reliable medium and the WSJ owner is Rupert Murdoch.

MrRage• 18 years ago

It's there now: http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2009/01/14advisory.html

bootload4• 18 years ago

"... It's there now ..."

Thats what I'm looking for, Apple confirmation.

mootymoots• 18 years ago

I'd be surprised if its untrue...

answerly• 18 years ago

Just terrible news and so unfortunate that it has to play out this way. I can't imagine how difficult it must be to have to deal with a (seemingly) serious medical issue and have to justify every related move to the public.

gamache• 18 years ago

He doesn't have to justify anything to anyone. It's just that Apple's runaway success has depended, depends, and will probably continue to depend on Steve Jobs being there. He knows it, and everyone with AAPL stock knows it too.

Alex39172• 18 years ago

What's more terrible and unfortunate is the fact that not only is this the top story on CNN and Google News, but today's supreme court decision doesn't even make it onto either page. Not even below the fold.

jfornear• 18 years ago

This shouldn't be surprising at all. Priority in news is not determined by what we might consider to be of real or objective importance.

lyime• 18 years ago

Thats not terrible at all. I am rather glad that is not in the likes of breaking news. Somethings should be low key. His life is not everyones business. People who need to know about Mr. Jobs will find out either way.

someperson• 18 years ago

For those of us who are out of the loop, what was todays supreme court decision?

TomOfTTB5• 18 years ago

This is not terrible news. Terrible news would be him staying on while he was sick and making it worse. The man is taking a really brief respite to rest after contracting an illness. That's what he's SUPPOSED to do.

Realty check: People get sick and they rest and then they get better. That's what's happening here.

If this were undiagnosed, or a really serious condition, or life threatening, or anything like that I'd have a different opinion. But as of right now all I see is a bunch of people trying to make a really big deal out of a relatively small thing in order to drive hits/sell newspapers.

ConradHex2• 18 years ago

>Realty check: People get sick and they rest and then they get better.

Pretty often, actually, people get sick and then die. Especially people who've had cancer. :(

Reading between the lines here, I suspect his health is in really bad shape. I hope I'm wrong, though.

lnguyen• 18 years ago

Taking another look at the now and then pictures, I'm inclined to believe the worst. It's a feeling based on a personal experience.

Extended weight loss isn't something that just happens. Granted with the surgery he's had, you do expect some effects as the GI system probably isn't as efficient as it once was. But given the care he's probably receiving, any minor issue should have been resolved. And for any workaholic to have to take time off means that it's probably something serious.

Even with the best care, you can only make a diagnosis based on what you know to test for. You can treat the symptoms but if the underlying cause isn't detected, the best you can do is prolong the inevitable.

Hope I'm wrong cause it's not anything I'd wish on anyone.

sspencer• 18 years ago

It's on Reuters now, too.

Clever of them to wait until after the closing bell, but man oh man, that stock is going to plummet tomorrow, I imagine.

Hope he's all right...

sachinag• 18 years ago

They actually had to halt trading; they couldn't hold it til the bell, for some reason.

socmoth• 18 years ago

you can see the after hours trading. 6pts already

edit: 7pts * 889M shares, what is a man worth?

gravitycop9• 18 years ago

The news was released after the bell. It was halted in after-hours trading. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=434426

henning• 18 years ago

I don't do any trading (and therefore don't own shares in Apple), but I wonder if people who have recently shorted AAPL are happy Steve Jobs is having medical problems? (Please don't downmod me because of the morbid behavior of others.)

jjs• 18 years ago

Where is Porsche when you need them?

gravitycop9• 18 years ago

Outcome-oriented individuals don't do well in the trading business. It's the processes that count.

time_management2• 18 years ago

It's not "clever" to hold the news till after the bell. It's done that way to avoid causing damage to high-frequency traders such as arbitrageurs and market-makers who, by providing liquidity, are good for a stock. Earnings are also usually announced at 4:10 for the same reason.

Zev10• 18 years ago

People need time off. Can we (as a culture) move on?

/edit: to expand: Mainly saying this because it's not the first time Jobs has stepped down due to health reasons.

mdasen• 18 years ago

I don't think this will change anything big. A leader is important to a company, but a leader needs to be able to create the kind of culture that runs itself when they're away. I'm guessing that Jobs did a good job of instilling the culture that Apple has today in a way that will continue because of how the workers see themselves and the company. It's sad to see him undergoing such medical problems and I wish him a speedy recovery, but I think Apple will do fine without him because he's given them purpose and direction and a definition that lasts beyond him.

I'm sure we all wish you a speedy recovery and many years of health!

jamesjyu• 18 years ago

You hear that? That's the sound of a million people ready to dump the stock tomorrow.

fuzzmeister• 18 years ago

Hope he gets better soon, can't imagine how frustrated such a work-oriented person must feel about being out of commission.

On another note, might be a good idea to buy AAPL in a few days. Long-term, I think Apple will succeed, with or without Jobs at the helm, but it's sure as hell going to be down over the next few days.

numair• 18 years ago

"...Long-term, I think Apple will succeed, with or without Jobs at the helm..."

You obviously weren't with us in the 90s.

netcan2• 18 years ago

You know, I'm sure Jobs did good. But I think a lot of it was timing.

Apple's thing is all-in-one machines that are sexy. Always has been. Phones, MP3s players, maybe TVs & that whole market really moved towards Apple's pre-existing strategies. The 90s were about being able to afford to put a computer on each desk. They were never as good at that.

Zev10• 18 years ago

How Steve was outed in the 80's is far different then how he would leave if he had to leave today. In the 80's, he was forcibly removed from his position and couldn't set anything up. Today? Apple has people like Schiller, Ive and Cook - all more then capable - to run things.

//edit: Fixed the dates. Thanks for pointing it out. And yes, I did typo twice ><

steveplace4• 18 years ago

Because their cash flow from their current product lines will dry up as soon as he leaves.

gravitycop9• 18 years ago

US STOCKS-Futures fall on Apple news on CEO's medical leave http://www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/idUSN14482585200901...

Nasdaq stock index futures fell as much as 16 points. Apple shares were halted in after-hours.

swombat• 18 years ago

Cool. So I guess the best bet is to wait till the stock drops artificially tomorrow and then buy buy buy!

mattmaroon3• 18 years ago

Yeah actually. I've got a few put contracts I'm going to dump. I've been betting against Jobs's health for a while. Plan B all along has been to go long after that happened. He's just not as important to that company as the market believes, because no man is that good.

Alex39172• 18 years ago

It looks like Fred Wilson got out while the getting was good:

http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2009/01/selling-apple-a.html

phony_identity• 18 years ago

Ugh.

tlrobinson3• 18 years ago

AAPL peaked at $200 a year ago. Should have sold then :(

inovica• 18 years ago

Stock, stock, stock. Thats what most people are talking about. I saddens me that this guy is obviously seriously ill and all that people can first think about is the stock price. Personally I wish him the very best of luck with whatever his medical condition is. Without his input into the world of computing (despite the negatives that he allegedly has) we would live in a different world to the one we now have. He was there from the very beginning of the personal computer revolution and I have a lot of respect for him. Above all though he's a human being and both he and his family must be going through a lot at the moment. My wishes are with them and hope that he recovers.

Oh, and I own Apple stock too

davidw• 18 years ago

> I saddens me that this guy is obviously seriously ill and all that people can first think about is the stock price.

I don't want to appear callous, but people get sick all the time, and most people don't really notice or care. People notice in this case because Jobs is viewed as being critical to Apple's success, and has a track record of innovation, is a famous, wealthy guy, has affected the lives of millions, etc...

One of the good things about markets is that they can make transactions possible covering a very broad range of actors (see "I, Pencil"), some of whom might even detest each other, were they to meet in person. This, on the other hand, is one of those cases where markets come across as sort of cold and impersonal in a bad way, because the potential loss of millions of dollars has a way of focusing people's attention much more than the illness of some random person. They're two sides of the same coin.

MikeCapone• 18 years ago

If you really care about sick people and dying people, donate to the Methuselah Foundation (google it, or Aubrey de Grey). 150,000 people die of aging-related diseases every day, and almost nobody is working on curing that.

Robin_Message• 18 years ago

I'd say if you care about sick and dying people, you should donate money to Medecins Sans Frontiers* or another development charity. Simple, basic medical care is much cheaper than trying to prolong life (per person) so you will be helping more people, often children who have full lives ahead of them.

*http://www.msf.org/

mattmcknight2• 18 years ago

I agree. I first felt bad for him and bad for the world getting ever closer to losing his creativity and vision. It's sad.

I bought some Apple in 2008 when it dipped to about $88, but dropped out around $97 when I made my target profit on it. I do think the stock price is a proxy for "How will Apple do without Jobs", which many are curious about.

TweedHeads• 18 years ago

Expect a new iPhone, MacBooks and iMacs by the end of june

And one more thing ;-)

mattmaroon3• 18 years ago

Time to sell those puts.

steveplace4• 18 years ago

If you're going to get into options, you can sell a bullish straddle, but that assumes that the share price won't go back to its highs (a fair assumption).

Selling put verticals would work too as it limits your risk.

Actually selling puts is going to depend on what the implied volatility looks like on the open.

Of course I'll be on my blog and stocktwits talking about it at 935 tomorow.

mattmaroon3• 18 years ago

No, I meant sell put contracts I had already purchased. I'm not that brave.

jws• 18 years ago

It is now about 30 minutes after this broke, there are 10 articles about it posted to Hacker News.

My take is that it will have a good couple of days of news cycle, but ultimately isn't that important to anyone but Steve Jobs, his family, and friends.[1]

The key of Jobs at Apple is that he demonstrated a "different way". The Scully years were about performing business: perform incremental improvement, manage costs, and earn a return on investment. The return of Jobs was the proposition that the company could [also|instead] succeed by fostering a reputation for quality of user experience and changing the product landscape to make new opportunities[2]. That proposition is now proven, there is a generation of leaders (and lead) in the company that know this and believe it.

They should get along just fine.

What they will lose is the "star power" of Jobs and all the easy copy that media companies could generate based on that. That will hurt, less media coverage is not good, particularly since Apple is going to suffer though a massive salvo of easy FUD articles.

[1] if he has a family, he may just have an antiseptic white ceramic dwelling staffed by obedient Eve clones for all I know.

[2] also, break some eggs if you are making an omelette.

sabat3• 18 years ago

Horrible news. Worse, the SEC is likely to come after him if it turns out (as we all probably think it will) that he's facing another round of cancer treatment. Now he's facing legal action as well, by publicly denying he has cancer.

steveplace4• 18 years ago

I'm betting on a investor lawsuit over the SEC. If they knowingly misled their shareholders they're in for a world of hurt.

mattmcknight2• 18 years ago

That's certainly what most people on CNBC were pulling for tonight.

herdrick• 18 years ago

This is awful.

In retrospect Jobs' hormone explanation for his weight loss looks like self-delusion. But I wanted to believe, too.

Hope everyone on HN is doing OK.

kyofiyfi• 18 years ago

All the news cares about is AAPL and not Apple or Jobs The Human. I'm not surprised -- and no one should -- because it all fundamentally comes down to money. The people in charge care about money and I'm sure Jobs knows this. He's already probably dead to the investors anyways. Only hackers or other ancillary types (in the grand scheme of things) care about innovation or the tech behind it. So save your tears for Woz's wake.

steveplace4• 18 years ago

What's the over/under on a shareholder lawsuit?

TomOfTTB5• 18 years ago

Simple question for those who think there's more to Jobs' sickness...

Imagine you're a millionaire hundreds of times over. You get a sickness that makes you tired, causes your hair to fall out and results in you not necessarily being able to control your bladder. Wouldn't you take a few months off?

ssharp• 18 years ago

My prediction: I'll make a better % gain being short on PALM's inflated price post-CES then these AAPL shorters will. Apple is still an extremely strong company with lots of growth potential still left in the computer and phone markets. I'm sure there is money to made with these short term bets but I thought AAPL was bargain at the 85 close today, let alone what it drops to.

nikils• 18 years ago

is it time to start working on androind instead of iphone ?

time_management2• 18 years ago

I really hope he's alright. This is unfortunate, but I think the press is overreacting by automatically assuming the worst.

It's not shocking that a 53-year-old man would suffer a health crisis requiring a 5-month reprieve from work. He's a cancer survivor (and cancer treatment side effects often persist for years) with a hormonal imbalance. It sounds like he's doing the smart thing.

Part of why I think this is major news is that, unfortunately, a lot of people have health crises that merit or require half-year career breaks. I've seen a lot of people work through illnesses that really deserved time off, especially when I worked on a trading floor. It sucks that most people can't take breaks when they need to; in his case, it leads to a billion-dollar drop in his company's market cap.

froo2• 18 years ago

I'm going down the list reading a lot of the comments and there doesn't seem to be too many wanting Steve to get well soon.

So from 1 hacker to Steve, we wish you get better soon mate.

g__g• 18 years ago

lhorie• 18 years ago

Is it just my impression or has Steve Jobs become some sort of Britney Spears of the techie world?

Just the fact that this sort of gossipy news appears everywhere dones't bother me that much (that's media for you), but I wish people would stop their silly speculations about corporate implication and just let the man rest, like he's asking for. This isn't the National Enquirer...

Hope he gets well, being sick sucks :/

lallysingh• 18 years ago

Agreed. Frankly I think the man's contributed more than his fair share as is. He doesn't owe anybody anything. My guess to his sharing his medical status is more to protect the share value for the other people on his team, whose incomes may depend on it.

I hope the best for him.

froo2• 18 years ago

I think so too, to put it into perspective - even my mum knows who Steve Jobs is and she is even sad that he's ill.

I asked her yesterday if she knew who Larry Page or Sergey Brin was, she had no idea.

11ren• 18 years ago

I like Steve. I hope he's OK.

sabat3• 18 years ago

FWIW, the NYT is now reporting that inside sources are confirming that Jobs' problem has to do with nutrient absorption, not cancer.

jaspertheghost• 18 years ago

I hate to say it, but Apple's a company that's highly dependent on its CEO. It doesn't seem like it's a company that's very dependent on its talent, so if the "dictator with taste" steps down, I believe Apple is not going to be in for a great time.

weegee• 18 years ago

I hope Steve gets well soon. I'm afraid if he leaves Apple again, we'll see a repeat of the slow slide they experienced from 1985-1998.

Apple: Jobs to Take Medical Leave of Absence

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