IPhone overtakes BlackBerry in the corporate world

Mobile workers are giving up almost an hour every working day in sleep and exercise time, thanks to being able to work on the mobile devices which almost half of them had to pay for. The figures come from iPass, provider of single-log-on services for remote workers, which gathered the data by surveying 2,300 of its customers …

[NoneSuch]

As Dr. Evil would say...

"Righhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhttttttt...."

2300 people. Well there is a representative view. Plus, it is a report delivered by a company that provides iPhone integration (and from what I can see on their web site ONLY iPhone integration) to businesses. No bias there.

In my company there are:

12 Blackberries

7 Android (5 of which are used by IT staff)

2 iPhones (For VP's who use them for email only and we forward their company email to their Apple mailboxes.)

The trend I see is people dropping Blackberry for Androids. we have more phones than that in the building. I only detailed those used in the company business. If you include all personal phones in use as well the ratio is about 4:2:1 for BB - Android - iPhone currently.

[pstones578]

re the 2 iPhone users, can you not integrate them into your mail system directly? What mail server do you use?

[pstones578]

Can you not integrate the 2 iPhones into your internal mail solution? What are you using?

[Anonymous Coward]

Real Sales Figures

This article shows a graph representing 115K mobile phone users and how they break down for 3Q 2011.

http://www.iphonehacks.com/2011/11/gartner-iphone-loses-market-share-while-android-grabs-more-than-50-percent-of-smartphone-sales.html

[Anonymous Coward]

But read the commentary

The figures have to be put into perspective: Nokia still top, as to be expected. Apple expected to be in a dip because of the new model in the offing. Nokia and Apple being single firms, Android suppliers being wide spread across many suppliers, each with different interfaces, extras, quirks, Android releases. I believe Samsung is doing well at the moment; but the rest? How much money do they make? How long does each market customer tend to keep his mobile (Android users seem to change their mobiles almost as often as their underwear sometimes)? How reliable are the devices over, say, a full year of use? e.g. how often does the user do a factory reset, reinstall, seek supplier advice, search the internet for answers to serious problems? How do bog standard users manage with the device "out of the box"? Forget the tiny number who feel the need to reprogramme the Android ROM or gaol-break the iphone or whatever the equivalent is for the Nokia. Those are the kind of people who buy a car to play with in the garage instead of drive.

Just throwing random figures around is not clever and misreading one's own HTML referenced articles rather careless.

[Chad H.]

Unsuprising

The only compelling reason for Blackberries in the corporate world was Corporate email via BES. With Exchange Activesync MS pretty much killed RIM's reason to exist.

Only suprising this is the slow death, not the death march itself.

[Daniel B.]

Can ActiveSync remotely wipe a stolen handset?

Can ActiveSync apply security policies/restrictions on handsets?

... I thought so.

BB isn't just about "ooh mail sync!" but a matter of sane IT administration of mobile devices.

[Chad H.]

@ Daniel B

Question 1: Yes

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa998614.aspx

Perform a Remote Wipe on a Mobile Phone

Applies to: Exchange Server 2010 SP1

Topic Last Modified: 2011-03-19

Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 enables you to send a command to a mobile phone that will perform a wipe of that phone. This process, known as a remote device wipe, clears all Exchange information that's stored on the mobile phone. You can use the EMC or the Shell to perform a remote wipe on a mobile phone.

You can use this procedure to clear data from a stolen phone or to clear a phone before assigning it to another user.

Question 2: What policies did you have in mind?

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa998357.aspx lists some of the security restrictions you can apply

But apparently you already knew this so I have no idea why I'm bothering to link to it.... Its amazing what you can do when you spend 30 seconds on google.

[Annihilator]

@Daniel B.

"Can ActiveSync remotely wipe a stolen handset?"

Yes - on WinMo and iPhones certainly, and I'm told Android. SBS/Exchange has supported this for a while now.

"Can ActiveSync apply security policies/restrictions on handsets?"

Yes, as above. Not sure what levels you're talking about, but on the SBS machine I ran, it forced our connected iPhone to have a password and time-out lock (and rather p1ssed some people off as I recall).

[Gordon 10]

@danielb

With the advent of Good for iPhone and similar solutions be BB's USP is quickly becoming eroded.

With everything work related held in a secure container most of the management issues are also contained.

[Chunky Lafunga]

Muppets

So you volunteer your own kit to be 'integrated' into the corporate mail system then also volunteer to have your life taken over checking endless amounts of pointless twaddle you have been CC'd on but feel you must respond to; thus continuing the endless cycle of BS.

Why?

[Annihilator]

Simple

They'll employ someone else who's willing to do just that. There's always going to be someone keener and greener...

[devcellent]

BlackBerry Apps & Corporate Users

I was wondering if RIM has any program to facilitate corporations to adopt some of the productivity apps that developers implement. As we all know, we need to have more apps for BlackBerry devices. And in comparison, there are lots of apps for iPhone and Android devices. That's one of the reasons consumers are shifting towards those devices. Since many of the BlackBerry smartphones are corporate phones, there are restrictions on installing any app on those devices. As a result, developers could lose interest in developing apps for BB. I believe that there is a very good email plugin app, Email - Email ++ (available from AppWorld:http://appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/content/58884 & MobiHand), which might be very useful for power email users. However, it's not easy to get corporate users to install this app or any other app for that matter. RIM needs to have a program (if not already) of certifying apps, so that corporations would be willing to get those apps installed on their users' devices.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: BlackBerry Apps & Corporate Users

would it be your app, by chance?

[devcellent]

yeah!

[Annihilator]

Blackberry Balance

"RIM needs to have a program (if not already) of certifying apps, so that corporations would be willing to get those apps installed on their users' devices."

RIM couldn't possibly "certify" apps, there's too many variables as to what sort of app a corporation would find acceptable.

They have addressed it recently though, Blackberry Balance. Effectively it splits the phone in two - personal and corporate use, and data cannot traverse between the two partitions - the user is free to put whatever the like on it, the corporate side is effectively unaware. Not widespread yet, and will probably take some convincing of sysadmins before enabling it.

[ConexionPoint]

My Cisco phone was repossessed

Not so long ago one of the IT folks dropped by my office and asked about my 1,200 dollar Cisco phone. I looked at my desk and realized I placed the phone in a drawer over 6 months ago and basically forgot about it. I have only one communications devise and that is a iPhone. I have my Cisco iPhone application active at all times including Skype for my family, VIBER for my friends located in Latin America and a assortment of SMS apps especially the new LYNC SMS application we are evaluating. When I first transitioned I found the iPhone to be somewhat uncomfortable on long calls and the speakerphone was subject to issues with background noise. I then purchased a iFusion docking station in order to have a normal handset and quality speakerphone. This is the point I laid to rest my Cisco phone and never looked back. My iPhone docked in my iFusion has everything I need and more. Nothing beats this combination including the fact I’m keeping the radiation away from the brain. Nothing on the market comes close to iPhone and if you have a Cisco try the mobile application for its much better than the real phone.