It might come as a shock to find out that in an organisation as large as the Royal Melbourne Institution of Technology's corporate environment, half of the mobile phones used are Apple iPhones.
The university's executive director of information technology services Allan Morris, however, prefers the BlackBerry. "I've used BlackBerrys for several years. I find that for email, diary management, you can't beat them in terms of reliability," he tells ZDNet.com.au recently. "If you want something that's more of a business device, I certainly think that the BlackBerry's a win."
Morris currently uses a Bold, but has had no problems with other BlackBerry devices for the years he's been using them. Though he's steering clear of the BlackBerry Storm due to the bad reviews it's received.
The IT director understands why people would opt for the iPhone — there's the apps, the iPod capability and the phone's marketing appeal — but he has an iPod Touch for those things. "Would I throw away my BlackBerry as a business device for an iPhone? No I wouldn't," he says, quoting the better battery life and ease of accessing emails as some reasons why.
From an IT point of view, Morris finds it easier to hook up the BlackBerry phones, which he says only takes 10 minutes, but he confesses that it is because the university uses an email system for which the iPhone doesn't have a native interface, while the BlackBerry does.
When asked about other devices, although he knew there were lots of options on the market, Morris says he doesn't have many people coming to him and asking to hook up alternatives. "Out of 10 requests we'd be lucky to get one that wasn't a BlackBerry or an iPhone," he says. Popular Nokia and Samsung phones were not mentioned.
In the formative soup that is the global financial crisis, Blackberry maker Research in Motion (RIM) seems to be strengthening its hold on the business smartphone market, ripping market share from competitors like Nokia. Even the iPhone's glamour is unable to dent the company's success.
According to IDC data, RIM has been the only vendor to post a quarter on quarter increase in smartphone shipments every single quarter for over two years. In the first quarter of this year, it managed a 13.6 per cent increase, a good performance considering that the total market fell by 28 per cent. Year on year, RIM grew 112.8 per cent, compared to a year-on-year market growth of 26.5 per cent.
Although Nokia still leads the overall smartphone market, with market share for the year sitting at 70.9 per cent, this has dropped from 77.5 per cent recorded in the fourth quarter of 2005. Meanwhile, RIM has risen from 5.6 per cent of the market to 13.3 per cent from 2005 to 2007.
According to Mark Novosel, IDC market analyst for telecommunications, the numbers show that there is strong demand for BlackBerry devices in the corporate sector, but also reflects growing interest in the consumer market. RIM's consumer success was highlighted when Vodafone Australia thanked BlackBerry and the iPhone specifically for an increase in revenues at its recent results.
The iPhone has also enjoyed success in the market, selling 125,000 devices in its first three months in Australia.
I've used BlackBerrys for several years. I find that for email, diary management, you can't beat them in terms of reliability
RMIT ITS director Allan Morris
With analysts talking about consumers bringing their favourite devices into work and IT shops having to cater to their "BYO" mentality, there have been some speculation that it might be the iPhone that could challenge BlackBerry's success in the business market.
Yet the device many have dubbed the "Jesus phone" has suffered a slow path to gaining business credibility. In 2007, just before the vaunted release of the 3G model, Gartner warned that it just wasn't secure enough for business.
Gartner is able to give grudging approval, however, after a firmware update added essential features such as remote wiping and support for Microsoft Exchange push email. IDC's Novosel believes the iPhone is a "new kid on the block", and is in many ways unproven as a serious contender in the business sense. He points out that he hasn't heard of any major (numbering in the thousands) corporate deployments of the phone.
Probably the largest publicised move in Australia has been that of Lion Nathan, which recently bought over 150 iPhones for its corporate fleet, as reported by The Australian.
Novosel's view is reflected in his numbers, which show that iPhone shipments are not yet making it into the top echelons of market share. With Nokia first and RIM second, Samsung comes in at third place, largely due to the popularity of the Omnia, according to Novosel, which is Windows Mobile-based. Yet when ZDNet.com.au called around amongst executives, it was the iPhone that featured amongst the more entrenched BlackBerry and Nokia devices.
Interesting & helpful article, but the key thing you overlook is the ongoing price!
With Telstra a Blackberry is $59/month locked in to one user for a 2yr contract!
A Treo iPhone etc is $10/month (150MB plan) that can be cancelled anytime.
The other thing is that overseas roaming is a bit better with a Blackberry. Sometimes Treos etc need to be manually selected onto a particular network.
Keyboard thing is a preference, but I think emails are significantly slower without one.
I am an IT Manager with about 30+ Blackberries, 80+ HTCs & Treos, a couple of iPhones in our fleet..