San Francisco, Sept. 7 (Reuters): Apple Inc unveiled its new water and dust-resistant iPhone 7 with high-resolution cameras at its autumn product event today, and said a Super Mario game was coming to the new phone and Pokemon Go would feature on its upgraded Apple Watch.
The excitement at the Bill Graham auditorium in San Francisco was not matched on Wall Street as Apple's stock spent most of the session in negative territory before briefly showing small gains.
However, Nintendo Co Ltd's US-listed shares jumped more than 20 per cent to trade around $35 after it announced a new smartphone game in the venerable Super Mario Bros series, Super Mario Run, which will debut in December on the iPhone and iPad.
The world's best-known technology company said the iPhone 7, starting at $649, would have one, zooming 12-megapixel camera. The Plus edition, starting at $769, would feature two cameras.
It also removed the analogue headphone jack, as was widely expected. The new headphones supplied by Apple with the phone will plug into the same port as the recharging cord, but it will also work with Apple's new wireless headphones, called Air Pods, available in late October at a price of $159.
The new phone will start shipping in major markets, including the US and China, on September 16.
It will be launched in India in October.
"While the camera improvements for the iPhone 7 Plus are nice, they are incremental for most and the lack of headphone jacks could offset that for others," said Bob O'Donnell of research firm TECHnalysis.
He said Apple's new glossy black finish could be more popular than any tech feature, reflecting the slowdown in major tech innovations for smartphones.
Mike Binger, senior portfolio manager at Gradient Investments LLC in Minneapolis, said the disappearance of the headphone jack "will probably annoy a certain amount of people" but they would likely get over it.
"Every other release tends to be a better release. Most people's two-year contracts are nearing the end, so I think the iPhone 7, just from a replacement basis, will be a successful launch," he said. "We're in good shape for a nice sales cycle here, so I'm encouraged."
Apple typically gives its main product, which accounts for more than half of its revenue, a big makeover every other year and the last major redesign was the iPhone 6 in 2014.
Apple said its Apple Watch Series 2, with a swim-proof casing, will be available in more than 25 countries starting on September 16.
"I predict Watch sales will improve dramatically," said Tech analyst Patrick Moorhead. "Most of the current Watch owners are early adopters and the next wave could be 10 times the size of that market."
Apple also launched a new version of the device called the Apple Watch Nike+, in partnership with the athletic goods manufacturer Nike Inc, featuring GPS so athletes can track their runs.
Shares of Fitbit Inc, which makes activity-tracking bands, fell 2 per cent on the emergence of such a high-profile competitor.
Axing the jack, they say, paves the way for discreet, bean-sized earbuds that can simultaneously translate, filter out unwanted noise or let us control other devices by voice - and drive up the value of the so-called "hearables" market to $16 billion within five years.
It's the vision of the futuristic 2013 movie Her, where a human has a love affair with a disembodied voice in his ear. But some who follow the industry say it's closer than many think, noting improvements in wireless technologies, materials, artificial intelligence and battery life.
"It's surprisingly close," says Nick Hunn, a UK-based consultant who works with manufacturers and a group defining the short-range wireless Bluetooth standard.
Apple justified the removal of the jack as a courageous move to ditch a 100-year-old technology and make more space inside the iPhone. It offered as alternatives a lightning cable earphone and an adapter for the old type, but touted new wireless earphones.
