AT&T: 40% of iPhones are sold to enterprise

By on May 27, 2010 at 7:00 PM
Retail May 27, 2010

iPhone_3GS

Security concerns be damned, the iPhone is selling like hotcakes when it come to business users, said AT&T business solutions CEO Ron Spears. While attending a Barclay’s Capital Communications event today, Spears was asked how businesses are taking to the iPhone some three years after its launch. The answer, according to Spears, is very, very well. By his estimates, a whopping 40% of iPhones sold by AT&T go straight into the hands of corporate folk. All of this despite the fact that the iPhone OS is nowhere near as secure as corporate staple BlackBerry. But to this Spears pointed out that most CIOs are okay with having iPhones in their midst and that, for some companies, they’re even huge money savers being able to replace laptops. Here’s what Spears said in his own words:

“When the iPhone came out, what most people heard in the first year from ‘07 to ‘08 was ‘oh my God, it’s not BlackBerry secure.’ This is not going to work on the enterprise space. At the end of the day, it’s just software. That’s all it is. And by the time the 3G came out in ‘08 they had solved about 80% of the security issues. By the time the 3GS came out last summer, most CIOs will tell you today they have very few issues around the security that they need provided as they have come to know that RIM can do it because of the way RIM provides their solution. So enterprises today view the iPhone as a mobile computer. It happens to have a voice application on it. But what’s important is what you can do with it, and the way you can mobilize workforces, and specific parts of your workforce, not the entire workforce. [...] If they’ve got a field service force that needs one or two applications on a daily basis; do they need to go out and spend $1,000 or $1,200 for a laptop and then worry about sort of the lifecycle costs of keeping up with the laptop?”

Let fire your comments, readers.

Read

Tags:
, , , , , , ,
70 Comments

Related Articles

  • Nostril Damus

    This means that AT&T and Apple have conceded the consumer market to Android. Wait, didn’t the iPhone start in the consumer market? Uh oh!

  • patrick

    @Johnathan. Or why not just compare android 2.1 and later with iPhone os4 and see who is on top at the years end. IPod and ipad sales do not count, unless you want to throw in kindle numbers.

  • K Gibson

    LOL!!! Apple…the AOL of cell phones! Enjoy!!! (just like u did with the short bus)

  • Senor Dickhäus

    Well, on the train from Connecticut to NYC every day, pretty much every suit on that train uses a blackberry. I’m a college student, so I obviously don’t work with enterprises or anything like that, but I’ve observed. These guys use Blackberry phones, not iPhones. I don’t doubt companies deploy the iPhone as a company phone, but I haven’t seen enough of it to take that 40% number very seriously. I could be off though.

    • pcfreek14

      I assume this is because NY has crappy AT&T service. In Chicago nearly everyone in a suit has an iPhone.

    • t

      that’s because their companies are in lock-step fear that anything but a blackberry is unsecure.

  • strider_mt2k

    Golly.

  • jonathan

    @patrick, sounds good to me, but it still wouldn’t be a fair comparison with the Iphone on one carrier. if the iPhone gets on Verizon at least, then we can gauge a better picture. For now, it’s doing great even on just ATT.

    Posted from BGR Mobile (iPhone).

  • prasad

    that’s a good deal I guess. Seems the sales will increase more now

  • http://www.theemf.org Philippe Winthrop

    Any device MUST be managed and secured. CIOs care more than you might think. http://bit.ly/cym0sS

  • Topher

    I want to know more about the numbers and analysis. Waht exactly is Apple calling an “enterprise?” Is it the small business owner who is using an iPhone for business and personal use and just using the business to pay for it? Or is an enterprise a larger company with hordes of employees getting iPhones? There are a lot of people out there who are running a small store front or working from home, but buying “business” phones. I suppose if a commercial account, you could consider it enterprise, but most people think of large companies when the word “enterprise” is used.

  • Gary

    haha. Obviously these CIOs are complete idiots. They’d rather have iTunes than worry about whether or not their company’s data is secure. The iPhone is NOT an enterprise and is NOT secure. There’s a reason the president and everyone who cares about compromising data carries Blackberries. Was in DC last week… 80% of people everywhere carry Blackberries. There’s a good reason.

    Just google iphone hacks..

    http://www.iphonehacks.com/
    http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596516642
    I could go on and on…

    • Elrabin

      Agree 100%

      I am a senior windows/vmware engineer at a VERY large company and we do not and will not support iPhone for enterprise use until they can pass the same rigorous testing for security that Blackberry does.

      Anyone having to deal with Sarbox or HIPPA compliance knows that you have to have end-to-end data security. Encryption, remote wipe, security policies for devices and much more.

      Every single bit of data on an iPhone can be read by plugging it into a linux box. Regardless of it being joined to Exchange or having a PIN.

      That is not the case with Blackberry nor Android(running Touchdown) or Android with Sense 2.1 or Android 2.2

      All 3 of the above Android scenarios are in testing now and so far, they’re passing with flying colours. We’ll be able to offer to any employee Blackberry, Windows Mobile or Android phones for secure and compliant Exchange integration.

  • bubbatex

    This means there are more and more business people everyday who can’t make a phone call…..

  • Monkey Business

    I work in IT security and compliance, specifically healthcare, and do a lot of work in our mobile space, and the iPhone is a near-constant pain in my ass.

    First off, my company is standardized on BlackBerry. If you want a company-provided mobile device, you get an ATT BlackBerry, end of story.

    However, because we are more or less at the whim of the doctors, who love their iPhones, we had to come up with a solution.

    Our main problem was hardware encryption. When you’re dealing with someone’s medical information, billing information, etc. a single lost mobile device can cost your company hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars in cleanup costs. Consequently, we had to restrict anything outside the 3GS, because it was the only one with hardware encryption. Moreover, with BlackBerry we have much greater control over the device. iPhones are a relatively open, and fairly insecure platform. Finally, when an employee utilizing a personal iPhone leaves the company, they’re required to turn it over to IT so we can wipe it to ensure our proprietary and sensitive data doesn’t leave the company. If they choose not to, we remotely brick the device. Either that or get a warrant from the State Attorney General to go to their home and wipe the device in person.

    We had to put a clause in our iPhone contract that prevented people from Jailbreaking, since that opens the kernel to being compromised.

    The iPhone is a great consumer tool. But in an Enterprise environment, it’s a disaster in the making.

  • Chris13

    oh, I thought they meant like car rentals. Or Captain Picard has an Iphone. My bad.

  • Shelton
  • Karlh

    I work on a college campus and run all our corporate cell phones and Blackberries. I am always amazed at how many students already have Blackberries as opposed to iPhones. As for security the iPhone ransk third behind Blackberry and Windows Mobile devices. Only Android is less secure right now.

  • oldbluetooth

    My only statement is PROVE IT!! I cannot say that any of my working friends have an iPhone in Enterprise use. BB, yes, and a whole slew of Motorola equipment, but NO iPhones. Now you might say that is because I only have two friends, BUT, any business aquaintance, if you will and NO iPhones. so while I understand that the iPhone has indeed been approved by some IT folks for their corporate use, 40%, really. PROVE IT!!

  • Tommyboy

    IPhone for Business equals eye candy that can’t complete a conference call. However since the device is so nice and everyone has to have it no one cares if they can make a phone call.

  • Hockey88

    These iPhone CEO’s are probably associated with non regulated businesses. Certainly, any type of regulated business such as banks, insurance companies, and the health industry are not using the iPhone for their business enterprises. There is just too much consumer information and personal health information at risk. Heavy fines waiting to happen!

  • jonathan

    @pcfreek14, I hear you there. I too live near Chicago and see doctors, students, lawyers and other professionals with iPhones everywhere ATT is not bad in the area.

    Posted from BGR Mobile (iPhone).

  • jonathan

    Though I love using my iPhone, I still think that the BB is more suited for corporate use because of email, but overall, the Iphone is still better. I have a friend that works for Baxter Medical which is huge and he was issued an Iphone. There are corporations that do use the iPhone but I don’t think it’s that widespread yet.

    Posted from BGR Mobile (iPhone).

  • FRZ

    Yet another over-glorified post regarding Apple. This one is hilarious too.

    Give it a rest BG.

  • http://www.lineartitle.com Jessica

    We recently made the switch from Blackberries to iPhones. I have been an iHater for a really long time (yeah, I said it!) but after being able to work with the two phones, I’d probably smash my blackberry to smithereens .

1 2
blog comments powered by Disqus