Today we are anticipating the announcement by Apple for a Corporate iPhone development roadmap. Since the iPhone has been solely optimized for the consumer up to this point, the next transition would be to add support for the corporate environment. By adding support for the corporate marketplace, Apple would be able to compete with RIM (Research In Motion) and no longer be limited to POP/IMAP email. Although it is currently possible to add an Exchange Server to the iPhone, the device does not support Microsoft’s DirectPush which would enabled the device to have fully synchronization of PIM (contacts, calendar, notes, email) in real time access. The existing options for push (instant) email on the iPhone are provided through an email account with Yahoo and enabling the “push” option in the settings, but results have been sporadic at best. Although the claim made by Yahoo and Apple is that the email is in fact push, the majority of iPhone users have yet to see instant email delivery on their iPhone.
At this point the best alternative is to add support for Microsoft Exchange which is often the backbone of most corporate BES (Blackberry Enterprise Servers) or even Lotus support. Both alternatives would deliver the real-time synchronization required in the corporate environment and most importantly they would secure the data in tune to most corporate IT policies. We anxiously anticipate the announcement by Steve Jobs today and really hope that the corporate roadmap ends up being as promising and we’d expect. Stay tuned for updates throughout the day.
