Apple’s CEO Is Treated for Cancer

Apple Computer Inc. Chief Executive Steve Jobs has had successful surgery for a rare form of pancreatic cancer, the company’s co-founder told employees in a companywide e-mail Sunday.

“This weekend I underwent a successful surgery to remove a cancerous tumor from my pancreas,” Jobs wrote in the e-mail. “I had a very rare form of pancreatic cancer called an islet cell neuroendocrine tumor, which represents about 1% of the total cases of pancreatic cancer diagnosed each year, and can be cured by surgical removal if diagnosed in time (mine was).”

Jobs, 49, who is also chief executive of Pixar Animation Studios, added that he “will not require any chemotherapy or radiation treatments.” He said he would recuperate during August and expected to return to Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple in September.

In his absence, Tim Cook, head of worldwide sales and operations, will run the day-to-day operations of Apple, maker of the Macintosh computer and iPod portable digital music players.

Jobs wrote that the far more common kind of pancreatic cancer “is called adenocarcinoma, which is currently not curable and usually carries a life expectancy of around one year after diagnosis.”

“I mention this because when one hears ‘pancreatic cancer’ (or Googles it), one immediately encounters this far more common and deadly form, which, thank God, is not what I had,” Jobs wrote.

The charismatic Jobs, who returned in 1997 to the company he founded after being ousted years before, has been credited by analysts and investors for reviving its fortunes, turning out a spate of successful products such as the two versions of the iMac computer and the iPod.