3G iPhone - The Business Perspective

• Posted: Tuesday, July 15, 2008
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• Author: pradhana
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• Filed under: Apple, iPhone, iTunes

News analysis: What's standing in Apple's way in the enterprise?

By Natasha Lomas

The 3G iPhone goes on sale this Friday 11 July and the launch hype is already in overdrive - but is the device really going to take the corporate world by storm, as O2 hopes?

O2 claims there's a lot of interest from business - largely because Apple has licensed Microsoft's ActiveSync protocol, so Exchange users will be able to get push email, calendar and contacts on the iPhone. This is why the operator has finally launched iPhone business tariffs. Previously UK enterprises determined to get the 2.5G iPhone had to sign up to an O2 consumer tariff.

Email is the lifeblood of businesses so Exchange support certainly removes a major barrier preventing many senior execs from clipping iPhones to their belts - at least, provided they can talk their IT department into adding iTunes support to its list of responsibilities.

That's because every iPhone user must have iTunes running on their desktop - not an ideal scenario for some businesses.

So even if senior execs get their hands on iPhones, the iTunes factor may make some corporates reluctant to push devices out to the rank and file.

Companies may also have misgivings about iPhones being too attractive to thieves as one CIO Jury member pointed out when iPhone 1.0 launched last year - and/or concerns about using the touchscreen keyboard, which is undoubtedly an acquired taste. Two-thirds of a recent CIO Jury IT user panel said they prefer a Qwerty keyboard over the latest touchscreen interfaces.

Read more - Silicon.com

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