Just how important in Steve Jobs to Apple? Important enough for some Apple shareholders to demand they know what the company plans to do in case Jobs does not return to the company.
Some shareholders submitted a proposal to Apple to force the company to reveal its succession plans for Jobs, who took a leave from the company two weeks ago for medical reasons. His third medical leave since he founded the company.
The proposal was submitted by the Central Laborers' Pension Fund and was backed by the proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services.
The group owns 11,500 shares of Apple, which represents about one thousandth of 1 percent of the company.
Apple's board wants nothing to do with the proposal because it says it will force the company to reveal names of executives who are next in line to be promoted, thus freeing other companies up to poach them away.
