BackApple unveils radio amid iOS software revamp to spur demand
Apple says iTunes Radio will be supported by advertising for some users
PremiumSan Francisco: Apple Inc. introduced a new music-streaming service along with sweeping changes to the software powering iPhones and iPads, seeking to blunt the advance of Google Inc.’s Android mobile operating system.
Chief executive officer Tim Cook unveiled a new version of iOS with a simpler user interface that will scrap features such as simulated paper and faux-wood bookshelves. ITunes Radio, a new web-music feature that will compete with Pandora Media Inc., will be supported by advertising for some users, Apple said.
The revamp of the software behind the devices that generate more than 70% of Apple’s sales is a crucial first step toward luring back consumers choosing competing devices. Apple’s iOS accounted for 18% of global smartphone shipments in the first quarter, while those running Android made up 74%, according to research-firm Gartner Inc.
Shares of Apple, based in Cupertino, California, fell less than 1% to $439.45 at 3:08 pm in New York. Apple shares have declined 37% before Monday from a record in September, a month before Apple’s last major product announcement. The period since the debut of the iPad mini is the longest product drought for Apple in at least a decade.
“Apple has been in a funk, and this is an important event to highlight how they are innovating," said Ben Reitzes, an analyst at Barclays Plc in New York.
Anticipation for the event has been building since Cook shuffled his lieutenants, putting head industrial designer Jonathan Ive in charge of the look and feel of Apple’s software. A longtime confidant of co-founder Steve Jobs and the draftsman behind the iPhone and Mac, Ive has been leading a remake of the iOS mobile software. IOS 7 also redesigns often-used applications such as e-mail, calendar and text messaging.
Apple also introduced a new version of its Mac operating system called Mavericks, aimed at delivering tighter integration with iPhones and iPads.
The software lets users’ appointments, password, map directions and other information follow them between devices, Craig Federighi, Apple’s software chief, said at the company’s 24th annual developers conference in San Francisco on Monday.
Apple has traditionally previewed new iOS software at the conference and then released it to the public when a new iPhone is introduced later in the year. As Google, Microsoft Corp. and BlackBerry try to lure engineers to build for their systems, Apple is trying to maintain the loyalty of those who create games and applications.
After Cook appointed Ive to rethink the mobile operating system, engineers raced to finish the software on time for Monday’s event. Ive, along with Federighi, took over the duties of former mobile-software chief Scott Forstall, a key presenter at past Apple events who left the company as part of Cook’s management shake-up.
Peter Burrows in San Francisco contributed to this story.
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