Forget the careful process of considering business cases, IT policies and other nit-picky consideration.
Apple Inc.’s iPhone is the new must-have device — even though the buzz du jour is whether to delay purchasing one because a 3G version is reportedly imminent — and executives in their infinite wisdom have apparently enquired why they too cannot work with the latest handset rage.
And, in the top-down structure of most businesses in the United States, what executives want, executives get.
Enter AT&T Mobility, the exclusive U.S. carrier for the iPhone. In January, the carrier said it would offer the iPhone to enterprise customers with data plans ranging from $45 to $65 per month.
Analyst Avi Greengart at Current Analysis applauded AT&T Mobility’s parallel move to simplify its enterprise-oriented data plans, but questioned whether the iPhone was suitable for enterprise, despite high demand among “individual liable” (versus corporate liable) and prosumer customers.
“Enterprise adoption of the iPhone could become ‘disruptive’ to the industry, although there needs to be a lot of work done on the application and device management fronts first,” Greengart wrote earlier this year.
Apple upped the anti earlier this year when it released a software development kit to encourage third-party applications, which presumably would include enterprise-friendly apps and conceivably would include device management services — a critical concern to I.T. managers charged with security.
Greengart noted that corporate discounts are not available on the iPhone and, though several companies have announced support for push e-mail synchronization of corporate e-mail to the iPhone, that AT&T Mobility had as of yet not endorsed those efforts.
So, will the iPhone sweep corporate suites? Better check your Web browser for the latest.
