IDC: Mobility Adopters Want Devices With Converged Features

A just-released survey from IDC shows that firms in the vanguard of mobile technology deployment and integration increasingly seek adoption of devices with converged features. These organizations have signaled plans to purchase converged devices/smartphones, mobile phones that are data-enabled, PDAs that are wireless-enabled, such as the new BlackBerry devices that can support data and voice telephony. Analysts say that organizations looking to effectively leverage mobility solutions to achieve their business objectives must not only integrate media at the device level, but also integrate the devices to their enterprise networks. "These organizations are moving toward device convergence, wireless LAN infrastructures, wireless access to back-end servers and corporate data, and deployments beyond basic PIM and email, all while instituting standards, policies, and processes to minimize the security risks of these investments," said Dana Thorat, senior analyst at IDC.

In the IDC survey, many enterprises showed that they are well along in the deployment of mobility solutions:

* 36 percent of the organizations surveyed said they provide wireless access to their back-end servers, applications, and/or data for mobilizing corporate applications.

* 28 percent plan to do so over the next year.

* Many organizations also reported that they have already mobilized applications such as CRM, field service, and sales force automation tools.