SAN JOSE, Calif. — Apple co-founder and chief executive Steve Jobs announced Wednesday that the illness he has downplayed for months even as it rendered him strikingly gaunt has turned out to be “more complex” and that he was taking a leave of absence from the company.
The decision was the latest turn in the tech icon’s semi-private battle with an ailment, still undisclosed, that is testing not just his health but his renowned urge to control every detail.
It also comes as the prosperous economic era in which Jobs, 53, launched the iPod and the iPhone — two products that seemed to embody the epoch’s infatuation with technology — comes to a crashing close.
Jobs’ long-standing reluctance to discuss details of his ailment and prognosis has infuriated some investors, and, as expected, Apple’s share price plunged 2.7 percent Wednesday, then another 7 percent in after-hours trading.
Few corporate leaders are as fundamental to their company’s identity as Jobs. In 1976, he co-founded the company that pioneered the personal computer. After he was forced out in a boardroom coup in 1985, Apple languished. He returned in the 1990s for the creation of products that have redefined the possibilities of consumer technology.
“There’s no company that gets scrutinized more than Apple and no executive under the microscope more than Steve Jobs,” said Michael Gartenberg, a tech industry analyst. “Nobody asks if (Microsoft’s) Steve Ballmer is gaining weight or if (Dell’s) Michael Dell has the sniffles or if (Google’s) Eric Schmidt has a headache.”
Jobs said he plans to be absent until the end of June. Tim Cook, an executive who has been with the company since 1998, will handle day-to-day operations.
“During the past week, I have learned that my health-related issues are more complex than I originally thought,” the announcement said. “In order to take myself out of the limelight and focus on my health, and to allow everyone at Apple to focus on delivering extraordinary products, I have decided to take a medical leave of absence.”
“There’s such a cult of personality around Jobs that it looks to outsiders like he’s incredibly important in the day-to-day operations of the company,” said Adam Engst, publisher of a Mac news site called TidBits. “It’s hard to tell whether or not that’s really true or if there are plenty of other people to step in to take over chunks of his job. I hope and believe Apple is a sufficiently grown-up company that a key executive can step out from day-to-day operations without impacting it in a big way.”
