• silicon.com
• Technology
• Mobile

By Tony Hallett, 17 February 2004 15:15

NEWS IT managers in the UK are increasingly clued up on the capabilities of smart phones but that doesn't mean they are likely to deploy them.

The potential for handsets that are able to download applications and generally use higher-speed data networks as well as voice would appear huge. Figures from ABI Research project the market will grow to 150 million devices sold annually by 2008.

However, a study of 100 IT managers commissioned by mobile software company Intuwave concludes that the industry 'must do better'.

While, compared to a corresponding poll 12 months ago, six times more respondents say they now have a greater understanding of the devices, those who would consider deploying them to their workforce as a business tool decreased over the same period by 28 per cent.

"It's now time for a dispassionate, cold hard look [at the market]," said Richard Seward, Intuwave product manager. "Devices are just the tip of the iceberg."

This year's poll found handset and even subscriber costs are no longer big barriers. Instead, there are two main areas of concern: security and support.

There was an 882 per cent increase in respondents citing loss or theft as reasons not to deploy, and a difficulties with ongoing support would also hold back roll outs.

Seward added: "[IT managers] want the same quality assurance as software on a PC or Mac."

And while lengthy support calls and fiddling with settings is troublesome for users, for operators they are a huge headache. Smart phones are costing cellular operators about five times more to support than traditional handsets and it is proving relatively difficult to train up all but an elite group of call centre-based staff.