Apple Board among the worst: BusinessWeek

/companies/companies_a/Apple/images (713 bytes)New York: Apple Computers' board has been listed as among the worst eight listed in the 7 October 2002 issue of BusinessWeek. Apple chief executive Steven Jobs also has the dubious distinction of being a director of Gap Inc, another company that made the same list.

The magazine used criteria such as board independence and stock ownership for the listing. BusinessWeek surveyed 51 corporate governance experts and then conducted a proxy analysis that graded companies on governance and performance measures.

Gap made the list, BusinessWeek said, for deals that included construction contracts with chairman Donald Fisher's brother and a consulting deal with his wife. Apple declined to comment on making the list and a representative of Gap could not be reached for comment.

The boards of Conseco Inc, Dillards Inc, Kmart Corp, Qwest Communications International Inc, Tyson Foods Inc and Xerox Corp rounded out the list.

The companies made the grade, BusinessWeek said, for reasons like granting hefty compensation packages to flailing CEOs, having too many company insiders as members, and failing to notice or stop abuses that were happening under their noses.

BusinessWeek tapped Xerox for the list, saying that two audit committee members had attendance problems last year, and said director Vernon Jordan's law firm provides legal services for the company. Xerox has paid a record $10 million to US securities regulators to settle charges that it manipulated its financial results.