Jobs touts improvements in next version of iPhone
Apple Inc.'s Steve Jobs introduced a new iPhone Monday with a thinner design, a sharper screen and video-chat features, giving the company fresh ammunition against rival devices running Google Inc. Android software.
The iPhone 4 will go on sale in the U.S. and four other countries on June 24 and retail for $199 for the 16-gigabyte model and $299 for the 32-gigabyte version, Jobs, Apple's chief executive officer, said at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco.
"It's the biggest leap we've taken since the original iPhone," Jobs said.
He called the new model, which has higher resolution and a front-facing camera capable of video calling, the "most precise, beautiful thing."
The iPhone is now one of Apple's most important products, raking in more sales than the Macintosh computer last quarter. The new model comes to market as HTC Corp. and Schaumburg-based Motorola Inc. work to deliver iPhone rivals based on Android, the mobile- operating system software created by Google.
Android-based smartphones threaten to top the iPhone in 2013 by number of shipments, according to IDC. Shipments of Android devices may reach 68 million that year, making it the second-most popular operating system after Nokia Oyj-owned Symbian, according to Framingham, Mass.,-based IDC.
The iPhone accounts for 40 percent of Apple's revenue. Apple has sold more than 50 million iPhones in the past three years. Jobs, 55, counts on updates to entice new customers as well as persuade current owners to trade up to the latest model. Cupertino, Calif.,-based Apple has updated the iPhone each summer since the smartphone's debut in June 2007. It released the iPhone 3G in July 2008, which added support for third-generation wireless networks. A faster version, called the iPhone 3GS, went on sale in June 2009.
AT&T Inc. remains the exclusive U.S. carrier for the iPhone and buyers will need to sign a two-year service contract, Jobs said.
The iPhone 4 has a so-called retinal display that has four times as many pixels as previous models, Jobs said. It is 24 percent thinner than the 3GS and has improved battery life with seven hours of 3G talk. The phone will come in black and white.
The device has a new camera system, capable of video calling and recording high-definition video, Jobs said. The video-calling app called FaceTime, will be enabled this year only on Wi-Fi devices, he said.
Jobs said he grew up with TV shows like "The Jetsons" and "Star Trek," "dreaming about video calling, and it's real now."
The company also updated its iMovie program that lets users record, edit and share video on the handset.
"The iPhone is taking share from non-phone devices" because it has features that users could previously do only on their computers, said Gene Munster, an analyst at Piper Jaffray Cos. in Minneapolis, who is attending the conference. "It will have enough razzle-dazzle," said Munster, who rates Apple shares "overweight" and doesn't own any.
Jobs, in his trademark jeans and black turtleneck, was briefly unable to demonstrate some of the features because he couldn't get a wireless connection. He asked attendees to turn off their computers, saying, "I'd like you to look around and police each other."
There are now more than 225,000 tools, games and other applications available for downloading, Jobs said. That compares with about 50,000 for Android, according to Toni Sacconaghi, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. in New York. More than 5 billion programs have been downloaded from Apple's App Store, Jobs said.
Activision Blizzard Inc. released an iPhone application for its "Guitar Hero" game Monday for $2.99, and Netflix Inc., the online movie subscription service, plans to unveil a free program for the iPhone this summer.
The iPhone 4 will first be released in the U.S., Japan, France, Germany and the U.K. By the end of September, it will be available in 88 countries.
Apple said it will sell a new, 8-gigabyte 3GS model for $99 this month, making it the company's lowest-priced model. It previously sold for $199.
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