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Already a key component of business communications, e-mail is poised to push its way beyond office computers to accompany workers wherever they travel. By the end of the decade, wireless service that works and looks pretty much like the e-mail now available in the office will be offered as a low-cost add-on by cellular carriers. It will be easier to use, more readily available and considerably cheaper.
Cell phone companies, whose text messaging and wireless Internet services have been slow taking off with business users, are climbing onto the e-mail bandwagon. All five national cellular carriers and many smaller regional firms already offer Research In Motion's (RIM) popular BlackBerry wireless e-mail service to business travelers nationwide. And cell phone firms are beginning to roll out their own branded services, using e-mail software from IntelliSync, Visto and Good Technology.
But the real boost to the market will come from information technology giants Microsoft, Oracle and IBM, which are all gearing up to muscle in on RIM, whose handheld BlackBerry and e-mail software currently account for an estimated 80% of the market. In one example of the competition on the horizon, Microsoft just announced plans to include wireless e-mail technology in a free upgrade of its popular Server 2003 software due to begin shipping later this year.
It will take Microsoft and the other business software vendors a year or two to catch up, but once the bugs are worked out, their products will make wireless e-mail more convenient for business users, who won't have to work within BlackBerry's proprietary system.
For example, Scott Harris, managing partner in the Washington, D.C., law firm of Harris, Wiltshire & Grannis, swears by his BlackBerry but can't wait to switch to a service that's integrated with Outlook. "I'm used to using Outlook," Harris explains. "The truth is Microsoft features are familiar and easy to use."
The entrance of new technology providers will also lower wireless e-mail costs. Right now, businesses pay $25 a month for limited wireless data service suitable for normal e-mail volume or $45 to $75 per month for unlimited service plus monthly wireless voice plan charges. Those amounts are in addition to the $300 cost of a BlackBerry device or the $600 to $800 cost of a Palm personal digital assistant (PDA) or Windows smart phone.
As dozens of new smart phone handset models that are e-mail friendly hit the market later this year, costs will decline, and cellular carriers will offer larger subsidies on handsets as enticements for wireless service plans. Longer term, businesses that deploy their own e-mail technology will be able to bargain down the costs of wireless data capacity on the cell phone firms' networks, says Ken Dulaney, a Gartner wireless data analyst.
Corporate contract rates for wireless e-mail could easily fall to one-tenth the level of today's charges and still leave carriers plenty of margin for profit, Dulaney says. By the end of the decade, Dulaney expects the growth of wireless e-mail will lead carriers to bundle it into consumer voice-and-data plans for only a few extra dollars a month.
Researcher-Reporter: Gerry Moore
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