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Taking Smartphones To The Next Level

In this economy, it can be hard to think long term. So in our article exploring the smartphones' future as a business computing platform, we don't go the "In five years, we think companies will ... " route. We ask: How ready is the smartphone today to replace a laptop?

The article by Alex Wolfe tells me that any CIO without a clear strategy for mobile access to enterprise applications is going to get caught flat-footed very soon. Smartphones have only just gained the screens and power to handle much more than e-mail. Yet already, 30% of smartphone users use them for enterprise apps, our new research finds. Wolfe -- who writes the Wolfe's Den blog and is editor-in-chief of InformationWeek.com -- writes:

It's hard to escape the sense that there's a heavy impetus to take serious mobile apps to the next level. . . . UPMC CIO [Dan] Drawbaugh says several technologies being accelerated now -- specifically, improved solid-state storage and the rise of virtualization -- "will drive a dramatic shift in how smartphones will be used."

Think you can safely ignore the smartphone question until more certain economic times? Our survey finds the most commonly used enterprise application on smartphones after e-mail is Salesforce.com. If revenue falters, an IT project that could make salespeople more productive might look better than ever.

What's your take? Are you treating the smartphone as an enterprise computer, or is it not ready to graduate from just receiving e-mail?

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