Jobs’s job
Who are the candidates to be the technology firm’s next leader?

THE fuss began in June when Steve Jobs, the boss of Apple, came on stage in San Francisco to make one of the theatrical product announcements for which he is known. His trademark black mock-turtleneck was drooping from a fleshless frame, and his neck and cheeks were hollow. In hushed tones, the audience began wondering whether his pancreatic cancer—which he was treated for in 2004—had returned. The firm blamed a “common bug”, but Apple’s shares moved on various rumours. On July 21st its finance chief insisted that Mr Jobs’s health was a “private matter”, worrying investors. A few days later Mr Jobs called a reporter at the New York Times to explain that his condition was not life-threatening, but he did so “off the record”, so no details are public even now.
Focused on the next iPhone, not the next chief executiveReuters
Mr Jobs is arguably unique in the extent to which his identity and fate are intertwined with those of his company. Imagining Apple without Steve Jobs, or Mr Jobs without Apple, is difficult—as his exile from the company between 1985 and 1997 made plain. Only Warren Buffett, whose investment skill made Berkshire Hathaway what it is, has a comparable importance to his firm’s shareholders. But Mr Buffett acknowledges as much. When he had some benign polyps removed from his colon, he volunteered the details in a press release. He also publicly clarified his succession plan. Mr Jobs has done neither.
So who might succeed him? Tim Bajarin, an analyst who has followed Apple for decades, thinks that Mr Jobs has bred such a strong culture within Apple that there is “nobody on the outside who could even come close” to taking the reins successfully. He also believes that Mr Jobs has recently groomed “the strongest team he’s ever had”, making it even more likely that the next boss