Price Competition & Consolidation to Drive Surge in Email, SMS Will Also Post Solid Gains

BOSTON--Feb. 8, 2006--Strategy Analytics today released its Mobile Business Application Outlook for 2006, predicting robust enterprise wireless ecosystem development in 2006 in terms of vendor R&D, supplier alliances, user promotion/awareness, competitive pricing and ultimately the adoption of wireless business applications.

Business use of wireless data will step into the early mainstream market in 2006, growing over 20 percent to a market worth over $22 Billion in North America, Western Europe and Asia/Pacific. While casual SMS use will continue to dominate users and revenues, email will govern enterprise-sanctioned adoption. The race to supply email beyond the corner office will pit email specialists against industry heavyweights from both the IT and mobility worlds who threw their hats into the ring in 2005. Enterprise-grade mobile email users in these regions are expected to double in 2006. Recurring end-user expenditures on mobilized e-business applications, including SFA and FFA, will grow nearly 16 percent in these regions to eclipse $2 Billion.

"Email will pave the way in 2006 for a broader range of mobilized personal productivity tools and e-business applications." Comments Cliff Raskind, Director, Global Wireless Practice, "Led by Nokia/Intellisync and Sybase/Extended Systems, consolidation among email providers has injected a degree of necessary IT clout and staying power to vendors beyond RIM and Microsoft."

David Kerr, VP, Global Wireless Practice, adds, "Wireless enterprise devices finally caught up with our imaginations in 2005. From the Treo 700w to the Blackberry 8700c to the Motorola Q - an array of exciting converged devices were introduced that promise to finally succeed in blending voice and data functionality in a reasonable form factor. Challenges remain on the handset side in the area of ease of use, particularly in appealing to untapped user segments. There is no dominant UI metaphor in the converged device space at this time. Will Blackberry be able to extend its UI beyond corner office Connectivity Junkies or will Microsoft or Symbian succeed in optimizing the device experience for emerging segments of Connected Responders, Content Creators and PIM Freaks?"

For a chart, "Enterprise Wireless Data Revenues (North America, Western Europe & Asia/Pac)" see www.strategyanalytics.com/press/PR00257.htm

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