Blackberry WiFi

“After all these years, even for those who haven't been paying attention, mobility is finally getting interesting!

Craig Mathias’ words, not mine, but I couldn’t agree more. These 113 characters sum up Craig’s final thoughts in his NetworkWorld blog,  Redefining Unified Communications - DiVitas Changes the Game.

Covering DiVitas’ recent launch in which our enterprise social networking software now runs as a web-client on iPhone, Blackberry and Android smartphones, Craig writes,

“I noted a while ago that the future of enterprise communications is in social networking. It's easy to see why this should be: e-mail has become a vast wasteland of spam and other irritations, IM is increasingly in popularity among essentially all classes of enterprise users, and there's a fundamental requirement for file (and many other forms of) sharing within the closed-user-group paradigm. Closing the user base keeps the riff-raff and especially spam and other distractions out, and also enhances integrity and expands the range of possible functions while maintaining security and enhancing ease-of-use and productivity.

And that's where convergence/mobile unified communications pioneer is DiVitas Networks is going with their recent announcement, which also pursues one of my favorite directions (and a natural fit and requirement for social networking of any form regardless) - Web services. There's no software to load here, and instant support of a broad range of key handsets. Client behavior is uniform across handsets, minimizing the training and support load and maximizing flexibility. No new apps need to be developed. And a single LDAP directory can be used for all enterprise communications functions, meaning everything works the same whether at one's desk or out and about. This is a great addition to the overall power of mobility, and builds upon DiVitas' previous convergence and mobile unified communications capabilities.”

I love it when experts like Craig get what we do, but of course he’s not alone. A few other examples of digested analysis of our Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC) web-client launch: 

100,000 iPhone Apps. Congrats. Now Add Things Businesses Care About (Ted Schadler, Forrester)


• DiVitas's Mobile UC Now Available on the Latest Devices (Ted Stevenson,VoIPPlanet)
   
• DiVitas Ups the Mobile UC Ante (Bob Emmerson, TMCnet)
   
• DiVitas extends mobile collaboration to iPhone, Android, RIM (Stephen Lawson, InfoWorld)
   
• DiVitas Offers Handset-Agnostic Collaboration (Marin Perez, InformationWeek)

A BYO (bring your own) phone strategy is a win-win for companies and their employees. By letting people use their personal smartphones at work instead of corporate-owned devices, companies save thousands of dollars on overhead (device purchases) while letting individuals enjoy their mobile handset of choice.

The reason why this works is simple: Because we all use mobile phones so heavily in our every day lives, handsets (iPhone, Blackberry, Android, Nokia, Samsung, etc.) have become a very personal choice – more personal than any other business device in history. As a result, “prosumer” mobile phone users have gained an unusually strong voice in certain hardware choices. And they have been overwhelmingly voting with their dollars – for example, last quarter Apple sold its highest volume of iPhone sales.

Combined with web-based apps such as DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC), a BYO strategy makes for an affordable and secure approach to arming the workforce with devices that are business by day and personal by night. Enterprise Social Networking capabilities that keep them in contact with business colleagues are available from a single phone to become part of the mobile workforce.

“Over time, an increasing number of companies have shifted desktop applications targeting HR, sales, governance, and data entry back to Web-based centralized services that don't require a client…” according to analyst Rob Enderle in his article, Bring-Your-Own-PC an Option for Cash-Strapped Enterprises.

Adding to that, Enderle writes, “Employees, particularly executives and younger employees, when they needed a new PC simply bought one (generally a laptop). They used existing polices that provided for system access from a home PC to enable them for work. For those working from home, many have used their own PCs for years.

In addition, with the massive number of layoffs people have increasingly had to buy their own PCs while looking for a job — and when rehired, appear willing to go on using it for business.  Web applications make this possible because IT does not have to load client applications on the individual’s laptop.  

The cost savings is about $300 per employee per month that flows right to the bottom line at a time when profits are elusive for many companies. You can understand why neither the IT organization nor the line organizations that would have to fund a replacement program are eager to fix this.”

There are nothing but parallels between the BYO phone and PC stories. Companies save money by relying on employee-owned devices, and they maintain security and continuity by providing access to web-based clients (i.e. secure collaboration software). Employees get to use their device of choice – most often smartphones such as iPhone – which allows continuity in their communication and ensures they are connected to their colleagues when they are mobile. They reduce miss calls, which increases productivity and further improves the company's bottom line.

The debate about handset support in the Mobile UC space has officially been put to rest, according to a recent VoIPPlanet article covering DiVitas’ BYO (Bring Your Own) phone launch.

DiVitas’ Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC) solution is now available as a nimble web-client that can run on any browser-enabled smartphone, such as iPhone, Blackberry and Android

In his article DiVitas's Mobile UC Now Available on the Latest Devices, VoIPPlanet’s Ted Stevenson writes:

“DiVitas Networks today made an announcement that pretty much sews up [the number of supported handsets] competition for good (or perhaps makes it irrelevant going forward).”

He explains, “the flashy way to state what they've done would be something along the lines of: 'DiVitas's technology now works with the iPhone, BlackBerry, and Android phone—not to mention the desktop PC.' While those are the big attention-getters, in reality what they've done is to make their technology compatible with any device that runs a Web browser—a number that's growing every day.

He quotes DiVitas CEO Vivek Khuller as saying, the market reality that set the company on the development path that ended with today's announcement was the overwhelming predominance of what they are calling "Bring Your Own" phones. "We [started with] the notion that the mobile devices would be bought by the enterprise and distributed to the employees," Khuller told EnterpriseVoIPplanet. "The reality is that people pick their own phones. People pick their own plans, their own carriers.”

According to Stevenson, DiVitas has answered the call for a new approach to enterprise mobility. “Rather than negotiating with owners of 'closed,' proprietary operating systems in order to gain the access necessary to write native applications for more devices, why not build a way to accomplish the same end using a piece of open technology that's already on the device?

According to Stevenson’s analysis of DiVitas’ BYO phone announcement: “Not only does this vastly enlarge the potential market universe that DiVitas can address (nice for them), it makes the benefits of mobile unified communications (cost savings and enhanced communications efficiency), available to many kinds of organizations that would be unable (or simply unwilling) to try to impose on their end users the kind device uniformity that would have been required heretofore.

Citing an example of the perfect BYO customer, Stevenson quotes Ron Hutchins, CTO of Georgia Institute of Technology, "Universities constitute one of the most diverse handset ecosystems, where IT has minimal control over selection of handsets or carriers by students," he said. "With support for iPhone, Android, and BlackBerry, DiVitas would be able to offer handset and carrier choice that would be very appealing in a college campus environment."

DiVitas’ Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC) solution is now available as a nimble web-client that can run on any browser-enabled smartphone, such as iPhone, Blackberry and Android. This move by DiVitas enables companies to implement a BYO phone (bring your own phone) policy in which an employee’s personal smartphone doubles as their business phone.

What does this mean to organizations that are looking for an affordable way to mobilize more of their workforce without over-taxing their busy IT staff? A BYO policy means the as-yet un-mobilized workforce (such as corridor warriors) can use their personal smartphones – such as iPhone, Blackberry or Android – to double as a mobile work phone. And this enterprise mobility magic happens with little-to-no overhead because companies need not purchase a phone for every mobile worker (they are using their own devices). Also, there is no additional burden on the IT department to support individual devices (everything is managed as software at the server level).

This BYO strategy simply takes advantage of a major mobile-communications trend already under way. As much as 90 percent of mobile devices used in the workforce today are already personally owned, with only monthly cell bills expensed to the company. Furthermore, as browser-enabled devices such as iPhone, Blackberry and Android continue to gain in popularity, these mini/mobile-computers are predicted to become the de facto phone for business users.

With DiVitas’ secure Web client running on a personal iPhones, Blackberrys and Androids:

• Personal devices become a mobilized business deskphone – the smartphone carries the business number, eliminating the confusion caused when colleagues are reachable by two numbers (deskphone and cellular).
   
• There is nothing to download, upgrade or delete (the DiVitas app is accessed strictly via smartphone’s web browser) – there is no additional tax on the device or IT department because the application resides on the DiVitas Server.

• The web client can be accessed by a desktop browser.
   
• Companies still subsidize individual cellular costs, but they eliminate hardware overhead (additional device-purchase costs) in mobilizing the entire workforce, including traditionally un-mobilized corridor warriors.
   
• Even though devices are personally owned, they are as secure as deskphones and corporate-liable phones because the Mobile UC server is web-based and under IT control – should a phone become lost or an individual change employers, IT staff simply updates the server to disallow server access by that client.
   
• Individuals have access to smartphone-friendly Enterprise Social Networking capabilities (Mobile Presence and Status) to make them aware of one another's reachability. The ability to scroll through an interface-based directory to see who is available and where they are located is a powerful tool for ensuring colleagues connect on the first try.

A BYO enterprise mobility strategy saves money on overhead (no need to buy additional smartphone hardware for non-mobilized workers.) It also makes your employees happy – and hence more productive – to be using their favorite phone by day (work) and night (pleasure) rather than juggle two sets of phone instructions.

For guests of a casino, the name of the game is getting the most out of your stay. So imagine a scene where a casino’s amenities are directly accessible from a guest’s personal iPhone, Blackberry, Android … or any other web-enabled mobile phone. One tap to the directory displayed on their smartphone and a guest has reached, say, the concierge or the reservation desk at one of the casino’s restaurants.

Next imagine a guest being able to use that same device to see where their friends or family members are located and what they are doing at any given moment. A quick glance at the smartphone interface and guests instantly know which of their party-members are poolside or, say, at the poker table testing their luck.

As futuristic as these on-the-fly conveniences sound, they are available today from casinos that have deployed DiVitas Mobile UC with a goal toward differentiating themselves in the very competitive hospitality market.

Casino guests can simply point their smartphone browser at the Casino’s DiVitas server to gain access to a temporary client – meaning their personal phone is transformed into a hotel guest phone.

The client authorization can be issued by the casino, lasting only for the duration of the guest’s casino stay. Once the guest leaves, the session is terminated. Of course when the guest returns to the casino another day, the client can be reinstated again (on a temporary basis). There is nothing to download, and casino IT is not involved beyond configuration of the DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC) server.

Guests gain several conveniences with a temporary DiVitas client:
 

• They are able to use their personal smartphone (iPhone, Blackberry, Android, etc.)  to gain a mobilized hotel room phone – they can place and/or receive calls from their hotel room number without being tethered to the hardwired phone.
   
• DiVitas provides one-click access to all resort services from the guest’s personal mobile phone – using the hotel directory that is accessible from their personal phone interface, they can simply touch-dial the iPhone, Blackberry or Android screen to reach the concierge, book tickets for a show or make a dinner or spa reservation.
   
• Guests’ party members stay connected and engaged via voice or IM. Meanwhile, the DiVitas Mobile UC solution's enterprise social networking capabilities let party members tell one another what they are doing and where they are doing it by updating their Mobile Presence (i.e. icon indicating available by IM only) and status (i.e. text reading “at the poker table”).

Casino's also gain a more mobile workforce because staff similarly benefits from the mobile social networking software advantages offered by the DiVitas client. Casinos can use DiVitas to increase staff efficiency by making them continuously reachable. Casino Staff:

• Leverages Mobile Presence and Status to maintain awareness of colleague availability – managers can, for example, quickly find the most available staff member to attend to a guest’s need by scanning Presence and status updates from the mobile phone interface.
   
• Gains a mobilized business number and IM – the mobile user can decide which method of communication (voice or IM) is optimal depending on what is indicated by the colleague they are trying to reach (available by voice, text or Do Not Disturb).
   
• Are made available by a single business number – there is no need to know individual cell phone numbers because all casino workers are reachable by their mobilized casino-business number, and their extensions can be accessed via a directory on the smartphone interface.

Want to know how to affordably mobilize your workforce? Implement a BYO phone (bring your own phone) policy in which an employee’s personal smartphone doubles as their business phone. This works for iPhone, Blackberry, Android or any other web-enabled mobile devices.

Let's face it. Popular devices such as iPhone are quickly making their way into the workplace. And a BYO enterprise mobility strategy saves money on overhead (no need to buy additional smartphone hardware for non-mobilized workers.) It also makes your employees happy – and hence more productive – to be using their favorite phone by day (work) and night (pleasure) rather than juggle two sets of phone instructions.

In keeping with this strategy, I read an interesting FierceWireless blog posted by IDC analyst Stephen Drake about what companies can do to best take advantage of this “individual-liable” trend in enterprise mobility.
 
[Note: Drake defines "Individual-Liable" devices as either: 1) Purchased by the user and expensed back, but not reimbursed formally by a company-established policy, or 2) Purchased outright by the individual user, brought into the workplace, and used for either corporate or standalone business applications.]

Says Drake in his article How businesses can embrace individual-liable smartphones, “With the smartphone market expected to outshine the overall mobile phone market for the foreseeable future, the growing influence of new devices and platforms, including Apple, RIM [Blackberry], Android, Palm, etc. … the critical nature of the individual-liable business device is evident.”

In fact, IDC’s Drake predicts the individual-liable business-use mobile phone will experience more growth than corporate-liable devices. Also, the researcher says it’s seeing a trend in which large companies begin to move towards the individual-liable business use device model.

The benefit, he says, is “a slowdown on costs and provides better choice, user control and delivers an image that IT is being progressive in enabling such choice to its worker base.”

“Add that to the growing number of smartphones coming on the market. Certainly the strong popularity of the iPhone, continued consumer push from RIM and  the large Windows Mobile OEM base drives much of the individual-liable business use in the U.S. In addition, devices such as the Palm Pre, Nokia's E Series (in particular the E71) and the new Android tide rolling in all speak to the importance of this individual-liable business use case.”

In his blog, Drake lays out a list of advice-points to be heeded by any company following the BYO phone strategy for enterprise mobility.

As for DiVitas, we recommend pairing the BYO phone strategy with Mobile Unified Communications Mobile UC) web client, which is under IT control and which enables the smartphone to carry the deskphone number. At the same time the device and business number tie in with voice, IM and social networking (Mobile Presence and Status) to help employees connect on the first try – and eliminate missed calls to further reduce cellular costs.

With DiVitas’ secure Web client running on an individual-liable iPhones, Blackberrys and Androids:

• There is nothing to download, upgrade or delete (app is accessed strictly via smartphone’s web browser.)
   
• The web client can be accessed by any device (handsets or desktops.)
   
• Companies still subsidize individual cellular costs, but they eliminate hardware overhead (additional device-purchase costs) in mobilizing the entire workforce, including traditionally unmobilized corridor warriors.
   
• Individual-liable devices are as secure as deskphones and corporate-liable phones because the Mobile UC is web-based and under IT control.
   
• Individuals have access to Enterprise Social Networking capabilities to make individuals aware of one another's reachability.

Dear Mr. President,

I wasn’t at all surprised to see the online inquiry your office made about the DiVitas Enterprise Social Networking capabilities this week.

Everybody is well aware of how hard you lobbied to keep your Blackberry smartphone after you took office. After all, in this era of on-the-go communications, even Presidents can feel the addiction of having mobile email and texting capabilities. And then there’s Twitter, which played a major role in your Presidential campaign.

Let’s face it. You are a person who likes to stay connected, and you are one who appreciates, and takes advantage of, apps that keep friends, fans and colleagues in the loop.

At the same time, as President, you understand the need to balance Social Networking with security. Blasting out your Status to eager followers or sending a text message to your campaign staff is one thing. But when that text message reveals info that could threaten national security – which pretty much describes a president’s sphere of information – it’s time to rethink the information-sharing strategy.

And this is why your office needs, and is apparently seeking, a secure application for collaboration and Status-sharing within the presidential community. So I can absolutely understand your interest in investigating DiVitas Enterprise Social Networking capabilities.

While Twitter and Facebook are ideal for consumer use (and hence run the risk of information security breaches), Enterprise Social Networking included in DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC) is appropriate – and secure – for business. Through DiVitas, organizations like the presidential office can send secure IM or broadcast status information to a pre-defined community like “The Joint Chiefs of Staff.” Once your community is defined, you can be confident that information is contained within that specific group.  Hence, there is no worry associated with information getting into the wrong hands.

Organizations deploying DiVitas enjoy the benefit of business voice (deskphone number) combined with Social Networking (Mobile Presence, mobile Instant Messaging (IM) and Status message) and placed onto a smartphone – without sacrificing information security. This is because DiVitas limits access to a specific, and secure, group of people (colleagues within your organization).

Addressing the need for Enterprise Social Networking, Mobile UC:

• Has a customizable Status message to broadcast exactly what you are doing at a given moment – a must-have when you need to know if a colleague is reachable. Personal Status messages such as “meeting with congress about healthcare” or, “about to board Air Force One” speak volumes when you need to let authorized colleagues know your whereabouts.
   
• Uses Mobile Presence to broadcast your status to your entire community (users within your organization i.e. the presidential office.) One glance at the directory displayed on your DiVitas smartphone and you can see who is available (by voice and/or text) or unavailable at any given moment.  
   
• Enables Instant Messaging (IM) so that colleagues can discreetly send each other brief text messages – handy when you are meeting with foreign leaders and a voice conversation isn’t appropriate, convenient or necessary!

If you or your executive staff were to use DiVitas Mobile UC instead of consumer apps such as Twitter or Facebook for Social Networking, your office could set aside fears of security breaches. At the same time, individuals in the organization would be able to take advantage of the productivity-enhancing collaboration and sharing benefits offered by social media.  

And you could even add The First Lady to your community, enabling her to easily and securely send you an IM asking you to pick up a quart of milk on your way home from the office.

Siliconindia’s July 2009 issue focuses on the “emerging enterprise wireless” space, and includes an article contributed by DiVitas on this topic.

In this article we describe the ongoing trend among universities to use Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC), a mobile social networking solution (Mobile Presence and Status) that integrates voice and mobile Instant Messaging (IM), to tighten the campus community. Mobile UC runs on any web-enabled smartphone i.e. iPhone, Blackberry and Android to mak faculty, staff and students more accessible to one another, leading to a deeper level of collaboration.

Following is an excerpt from Silconindia’s Universities Deploying Mobile Unified Communications to Keep Campus Connected:

“…In bygone days, students relied on dorm phones and university-supplied email addresses to contact one another. Today, however, students are primarily reachable by using a hodgepodge of private, unpublished cell phone numbers and email addresses. They also blast their whereabouts, and read about what their fellow campus dwellers are doing, using one of the many social networking applications like Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter.

Given this variety of communication mediums, it can be difficult to find contact information for a fellow student in, say, your math class. Individual, private contact information simply isn’t managed and published by universities. And this lack of a standard platform for phone and or text-based communication has contributed to undermine the social structure at a university, which by nature is a collaborative environment.

Secure social networking running on iPhone, Blackberry and Android devices (via Mobile UC) is changing all this. It is helping universities overcome the digital divide to recreate a sense of campus community.”

Read more about how the DiVitas's Mobile UC running on a iPhone, Blackberry and Android devices supports a full range of communications by combining mobile social networking applications (Mobile Presence and Status) with IM, voice and a university phone number, university directory contacts and Visual Voicemail.

Starting this month, $199 – the previous low for a much coveted iPhone – has become downright expensive for a smartphone. AT&T is now offering the Nokia E71x for one cent through Amazon, redefining the phrase, “world’s most affordable smartphone” and making it a hard-to-resist purchase for consumers and business users alike.

This news in turn makes DiVitas – the only Mobile Unified Communications vendor certified by AT&T to support the Nokia E71x – the world’s most affordable Mobile UC solution. DiVitas was recently named as an AT&T Fast Pitch award winner, and has also earned an elite placement in AT&T’s catalogue of certified partners.

News of the mind-blowing, one-penny price tag comes just weeks after the E71x wowed reviewers with its affordable $99.99 price tag. Even at around 100 bucks, the E71x was a lot of phone for the price.

Reviewers at CNET (where users gave the E71x four out of five stars) highlighted the phone’s slim design, full QWERTY keyboard, voice-guided GPS, digital camera and Web browser, saying, “AT&T made an attractive device even more attractive by giving the Nokia E71x a $99.99 (with two-year contract) price tag. It's a great value, especially compared to AT&T's other QWERTY smartphones, such as the Samsung Epix and RIM BlackBerry Bold, considering what you get and the quality of the phone's design.”

Knocking the price-of-E71x-ownership down further, users aren’t required to pay for a monthly data plan, which is unusual for a smartphone purchase. Eliminating the $40ish per/user monthly data plan is a key benefit for organizations such as universities where many employees only require a mobile phone during the business day. Administrative staffers, for example, have access to the campus WLAN while they are at work, allowing them to use the E71x in WiFi-mode to place calls, send email or IM, or update their Presence Status Message. They don’t need to be available after business hours, and with the E71x they now have an affordable single-mode option.

According to Amazon:

• List Price:$399.99
• Your Price:$0.01 (with new service plan)
  
• You Save:$399.98 (100%)
  
• More Options: Buy without a service plan

We have a new addition to the list of analysts who have participated in our Enterprise Social Networking hosted trial program. This time we gave Yankee Group’s Zeus Kerravala some one-on-one time with DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC) running on a Nokia e71 smartphone. Blogging on his test-drive with DiVitas secure collaboration software solution, Kerravala says, “I consider [DiVitas] one of the more advanced FMC vendors, so it’s a good litmus test of where the industry is at.”

Here is an excerpt from his blog:

“The seamless roaming worked as advertised although this wasn't much of a surprise. This is a feature they’ve had around for a couple of years and they've always done a good job handing off calls between WiFi and cell service and vice versa. For me, this is a HUGE feature. At my home in the Boston area, my cell phone works like crap in my apartment so I rely on calling over WiFi to make calls. Without it, I'd have to get a traditional home phone (gasp!) and who wants to do that? With the traditional UMA type of software that I have on my T-Mobile phone, the call drops every time I go outside and I get out of WiFi range, so there is some practical applicability to it.

The other big change to just making calls is that the phone they sent was much better. They have the software on a Nokia E71 which is so much better than the older versions of the Nokia phones (E62, E61 etc.). The keyboard and screen are much better than older versions and it actually has a camera too (welcome to 2009, Nokia). I still think the Blackberry Curve is the best smart phone out there, but it's a matter of opinion and this device isn't all that far behind it yet. The other thing Nokia fixed is that it has a real headphone jack instead of some goofy proprietary port that you need a special cable for to connect headphones.

The big feature with the DiVitas software, though, was the unified communications features. Again, I've seen the presence, chat and visual voice mail before, but it was quite different when actually using it. I currently run IBM's mobile Sametime on my Blackberry so I'm sold on the concept of mobile presence. In fact, because I'm normally engaged with another activity when mobile (driving, walking, etc) I think mobile presence is actually more important than desktop based presence.

On the positive side, the experience was great. I was able to set my availability by selecting preset presence icons such as available by voice only, text only, voice or text, do not disturb etc. Because I spend far too much time in meetings or traveling around the world I can see this feature being very handy. Co-workers will not only know if I'm available but how to reach me. What happens now is when I’m mobile, I'll be on the phone and someone will call. I'll then need to grab my other cell phone and text the person back (if they're on a mobile) that I'll call them when my call is over. If it's not a cell phone, then I try and send an email on the other phone (I have two BBs which some people think is overkill, but hey, I like to be fully redundant). Even when in the office, I'm rarely at my desk, so being able to set status when mobile will definitely let people know where to find me (hmm… maybe I don’t want that). The other way I could handle this is to continually update Twitter or Facebook (or both using TweetDeck) but honestly, I get tired of seeing people Tweet stuff like "Enjoying two for one margaritas with Bob and Steph"). My community of people is pretty big now and not everyone needs to see where I am at all times.

The client also lets you create custom status updates, which is kind of mobile microblog. This feature allows me to tell people I'm busy and then maybe text or IM me if they need to reach me.”

To read the entire blog, visit the No Jitter website.

To: Tim Cook, Interim Apple CEO
From: Nancy Colwell, DiVitas Networks

Dear Mr. Cook,

I’ve got a deal for you that is guaranteed to put a smile on Steve’s face.

Everybody knows Apple has had startling success in the consumer space, with iPhone more than tripling its smartphone market share last year. But we know that Steve will not be happy until you reach smartphone world domination. So your next move is likely to target enterprises. Isn’t this the logical growth path for iPhone, having dominated the consumer space so quickly?

Mr. Cook, the shortest distance between the two markets is to work closely with a partner who has a deep understanding of the market you are heading towards – which is of course, the enterprise mobility market.

DiVitas has a unique perspective on enterprise-class dual-mode smartphones and what organizations are demanding today – devices such as the iPhone play a critical role in the total DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications solution package. As such, we have first-hand knowledge of what enterprises seek in a mobile device and would be more than happy to share all of our knowledge with your team.

Enterprises want and need more than a standalone, company-paid smartphone that is doled out to only a select group of employees. They want a phone that can be ubiquitously deployed across the workforce while able to:

• Able to achieve an ROI in less than a year.
• Support Fixed Mobile Convergence (FMC) for seamless roaming between free WiFi and cellular networks (needed for hard cost-savings and speedy ROI on mobile phones).
• Behave like, and carry the same number  as, an individual’s deskphone by integrating with the corporate PBX.
• Support networked applications such as mobile VoIP, mobile Presence, mobile Instant Messaging without dropping when a personal cell call comes in.
• Meet enterprise security requirements.
• Be managed under enterprise IT control.

So for now Mr. Cook, enterprises looking to deploy a business-ready dual-mode phone today must look to another handset vendor. And there is one available today - the Nokia E71 dual-mode smartphone. This device is currently used in several DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications deployments worldwide. It is also the phone that we use in our hosted trial program in which editors and analysts test out DiVitas on their own time, in their own environment (work or personal).  Nokia’s E71 also ranks well with testers who use an iPhone or Blackberry as their personal and/or business mobile phone.

But this scenario can easily change. With a few modifications we expect that iPhone will also be an exceptional enterprise candidate.

So we are here to help you turn the iPhone into iWin. Call us anytime.

Sincerely,

Nancy Colwell

To: RIM co-CEO Jim Balsillie
From: DiVitas Networks

Dear Mr. Balsillie,

We are writing to you as a fellow player in the mobile communications market – not as a RIM competitor, but as your future Mobile UC partner.

After reading your recent interview with the Financial Times – and learning how RIM is responding to Blackberry competition from the likes of Apple’s iPhone -  we feel compelled to extend an important message: Let’s unite Blackberry devices with DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications.

RIM is a proven winner in the market for enterprise smartphones. And DiVitas is the leader in Mobile Unified Communications. You stated the need to offer this technology to your customers in your interview with Financial Times' Ingrid Lunden. Why reinvent the wheel? Integration between DiVitas and Blackberry will enable you to quickly deliver a competitive edge in a cutthroat market.

We are convinced this would be a win-win for both parties. And judging by your comments about discussions with CIOs, you probably agree. “There is a “real urgency” around wanting more mobile unified communications … having the ability to integrate the BlackBerry devices with their existing PBXs,” you told Ms. Lunden.

Your perceived demand among your customers for Mobile UC/PBX integration makes perfect sense to us. We know CIOs want to reduce their mobile communications costs. At the same time, they want to make their employees more reachable. Mobile Unified Communications (Fixed Mobile Convergence technology combined with Unified Communications apps) lets companies reach these goals (cost cutting and increased mobility) by providing several capabilities:

1- WiFi calling to reduce monthly telecom bills (WiFi minutes don’t count against the cell plan):

• WiFi calls placed or received on-campus calls are free.
• International calls are free when placed or received over WiFi.
• WiFi calls placed or received from hotspots (home office, airport, coffee shop, hotel, etc.) are free.
• Mobile users can additionally create their own WiFi hotspot in any hotel room with WiFi – they can place free calls via WiFi and use their laptops simultaneously.
• Bridge vendors (who can charge thousands of dollars per month) can be eliminated by using DiVitas for free, in-house bridge lines for conference calling (international and local).

2- Mobile workers carry a single device and a single number to make them consistently reachable:

• Support for the Single-Number Reach capability makes a mobile device behave like a deskphone. This means mobile workers are available by a single phone number – the deskphone number – which results in fewer missed calls and helps eliminate the waste of expensive cell minutes

3- Companies leverage their existing communications investment:

• Deploying voice over the existing WLAN gives companies more bang for the WiFi buck.
• PBX integration provides support for existing deskphone features (call forward, extension dialing, call waiting, etc.).
• Mobile workers are available as if they were seated at their desks, regardless of where they are located (on-campus, in cellular mode or in a WiFi hotspot) when they place or receive calls.

4- Taking advantage of productivity gains through Unified Communications applications:

• Presence ensures that mobile workers are consistently reachable by allowing them to broadcast their availability and how best to be reached (phone, text, not available, etc.).
• Micro-blogging provides status details about where the mobile worker is and what they are doing (in a meeting, catching a flight, in the office, at the dentist, etc.).
• Instant Messaging (IM) can replace expensive text messaging for brief, discreet communication … but at no additional cost (provided there is a data plan).
• Visual Voicemail allows mobile users to eyeball messages sitting in their inbox, and decide which should be read first. This saves expensive cellular minutes and time.
• Single Voicemail Inbox Management means that mobile workers have only one voicemail inbox to manage --  the corporate mobile phone and corporate deskphone inboxes are one and the same.

Mr. Balsillie, the smartphone market is white-hot right now. And RIM needs to act quickly to maintain Blackberry’s position as the leading enterprise smartphone. There’s no quicker way to getting there than by dropping a proven solution into the Blackberry mix and offering it to your existing and prospective customers ASAP.

Sincerely,

DiVitas Networks

This blog has been updated to reflect DiVitas' expanded smartphone support, which now includes Blackberry, iPhone and Android phones running DiVitas' enterprise social networking solution.

When we originally wrote this blog back in January, we had allowed analyst Michael Stanford to test drive the DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC) solution using a Nokia ESeries smartphone.  However, his personal mobile device of choice is an Apple iPhone and he – like many of our customers – wanted to take advantage of DiVitas' mobile social networking capabilities on his favorite toy.

We came through on Michael's wish today with our enterprise mobility announcement that DiVitas Mobile UC now runs on all major platforms.

Building on the Nokia Eseries' established strength (one of the few handsets that support seamless roaming for free WiFi calls), DiVitas is now also providing an affordable, nimble and easy way for organizations to increase their mobile workforce.

Organizations can use DiVitas's web client to employ a BYO phone (bring your own phone) strategy, leveraging the increasingly popular use of iPhone, Blackberry and Android in the workplace.

Today mobile workers' personal phones frequently double as a business phone, but there are two phone numbers to juggle and there is no synergy with the PBX (business number and features such as extension dialing and call forward).

Now, with DiVitas' web client, a mobile worker's personal phone can become a mobilized deskphone that is under IT control - without having to download any software. An iPhone, Blackberry or Android user, for example, will have their deskphone (business number) moved onto their smartphone and those individuals will be able to place/receive calls from that business number or use IM and Social Networking (Mobile Presence and Status) from that single device.

For the individual, there is no longer a need to juggle two devices and phone numbers. For organizations, there is no need to purchase phones for every mobile worker. Meanwhile, Mobile Presence and Status are tied to the directory of contacts, which is accessible from the smartphone's interface, ensuring that individuals connect on the first try.

It's a new era for enterprise mobility and affordably creating a mobile workforce.

The debate about handset support in the Mobile UC space has officially been put to rest, according to a recent VoIPPlanet article covering DiVitas’ BYO (Bring Your Own) phone launch.

DiVitas’ Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC) solution is now available as a nimble web-client that can run on any browser-enabled smartphone, such as iPhone, Blackberry and Android

In his article DiVitas's Mobile UC Now Available on the Latest Devices, VoIPPlanet’s Ted Stevenson writes:

“DiVitas Networks today made an announcement that pretty much sews up [the number of supported handsets] competition for good (or perhaps makes it irrelevant going forward).”

He explains, “the flashy way to state what they've done would be something along the lines of: 'DiVitas's technology now works with the iPhone, BlackBerry, and Android phone—not to mention the desktop PC.' While those are the big attention-getters, in reality what they've done is to make their technology compatible with any device that runs a Web browser—a number that's growing every day.

He quotes DiVitas CEO Vivek Khuller as saying, the market reality that set the company on the development path that ended with today's announcement was the overwhelming predominance of what they are calling "Bring Your Own" phones. "We [started with] the notion that the mobile devices would be bought by the enterprise and distributed to the employees," Khuller told EnterpriseVoIPplanet. "The reality is that people pick their own phones. People pick their own plans, their own carriers.”

According to Stevenson, DiVitas has answered the call for a new approach to enterprise mobility. “Rather than negotiating with owners of 'closed,' proprietary operating systems in order to gain the access necessary to write native applications for more devices, why not build a way to accomplish the same end using a piece of open technology that's already on the device?

According to Stevenson’s analysis of DiVitas’ BYO phone announcement: “Not only does this vastly enlarge the potential market universe that DiVitas can address (nice for them), it makes the benefits of mobile unified communications (cost savings and enhanced communications efficiency), available to many kinds of organizations that would be unable (or simply unwilling) to try to impose on their end users the kind device uniformity that would have been required heretofore.

Citing an example of the perfect BYO customer, Stevenson quotes Ron Hutchins, CTO of Georgia Institute of Technology, "Universities constitute one of the most diverse handset ecosystems, where IT has minimal control over selection of handsets or carriers by students," he said. "With support for iPhone, Android, and BlackBerry, DiVitas would be able to offer handset and carrier choice that would be very appealing in a college campus environment."

I'm taking the opportunity to respond to a recent comment to our blog. (Thanks for your comment Gary, and for raising this comparison between RIM/BlackBerry and DiVitas. Readers, see comment at the end of this post).

We at DiVitas are great admirers of RIM’s business model for mobilizing business users with its BlackBerry devices. RIM is able to charge a premium for its technology because it solved the major productivity problem of letting road warriors access their email when away from their offices. You’ve gotta give credit where credit is due, and RIM with its BlackBerry success is definitely due some credit.

At DiVitas, our approach is more comprehensive than RIM’s with its BlackBerry. DiVitas brings the critical voice and Unified Communications component of mobile communications into the equation. Specifically, DiVitas mobilizes “business voice” in a similar way that BlackBerry mobilizes “business email.”

This is where the similarities and differences break down:

* Business email vs. Business voice, email, IM and Presence:

RIM’s BlackBerry only mobilizes email and supports carrier wireless phone services. DiVitas mobilizes the business phone (including corporate deskphone functions i.e. extension-digit dialing,  caller ID, call transfer, etc.). DiVitas also mobilizes Unified Communications (UC) applications such  as Instant Messaging (IM) and Presence.

* Cellular only vs. dual mode (WiFi and cellular):

RIM’s Blackberry runs only on a cellular network. DiVitas provides seamless roaming and runs on cellular, WiFi or both (dual-mode).

* Proprietary vs. Open standards:

RIM relies on a propriety model of using its own handsets (BlackBerrys). DiVitas works with commercially available Symbian and Windows Mobile smart phones. Since today’s smart phones offer email, DiVitas customers get mobile email (and corporate directory contacts) and voice along with mobile business phone, IM and presence in a single wireless device.

The fact is that today, a mere 5 percent of the workforce uses mobile email (according to Yankee Group and other leading research firms). These are the road warriors whose jobs require continuous communications and availability.

Another 20 percent uses mobile voice (no email), which means that a whopping 75 percent of the workforce (corridor warriors) have yet to be mobilized. We see this as a major opportunity for businesses wanting to increase availability and productivity across the board.

DiVitas can mobilize these corridor warriors, and at the least amount of cost, because they can primarily use free WiFi vs. cellular when placing and receiving calls, or sending and receiving messages. Mobilized corridor warriors will also be more available, which relates directly to increased productivity. Some of our customers have experienced ROI in less than 30 days.

It pleases us to be compared to a successful pioneer in the mobile-communications space. We are even more pleased to have the opportunity to shed some light on the differences between our two companies’ business models and technology approaches.

Question for DiVitas: t sounds like you guys are looking to go head to head with the likes of RIM. Considering RIM has this market all locked up, what can DiVitas offer that BlackBerry doesn’t do already?

—Gary Hill, New York

One key benefit with the DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications solution is that the mobile-communications infrastructure is under enterprise control. This doesn’t just mean companies maintain their own control over phone usage (call costs) and policy compliance. It means DiVitas users need not worry about getting hit by a major outage caused by, and fixed by, a third-party. This was the case earlier this year when RIM’s Blackberry users lost service for three hours.

According to a NetworkWorld article, RIM blamed upgrades to its security infrastructure as the cause of a service outage for its BlackBerry devices. About a week later, Blackberry users were out of luck (and service) again when another outage occurred and made headline news.

This type of outage happened because RIM has a single point of failure, and it failed. Enterprises have BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) resident in their networks and it hot-links back to the RIM Network Operations Center (NOC). When RIM’s NOC failed, Blackberry users found themselves without email service.

This kind of outage won’t happen to DiVitas users because the DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications architecture puts control in the hands of the enterprise. The risk of outage is on company-by-company basis, and therefore it is much lower.

Also, if there is an outage, it’s not an all-or-nothing scenario. Let’s say a DiVitas user’s network center goes down and the company loses DiVitas server functionality or WiFi access. Mobile VoIP users still, alternately, have the cellular component of their phones to rely on. Of course all of the Unified Communications features, such as Caller ID, presence, and Instant Messaging (IM) won’t be available. But then again users won’t be instantly and totally cut off from all communication. They can still make calls and use email via the cellular network. In such scenarios, inbound calls from the PBX will be routed to voicemail and can be picked up over the cellular network.

For a DiVitas user to lose email access, the company’s email server would have to go down. The email server is a second point of failure, and the chances that the network center and the email server will simultaneously fail are pretty low.

From a reliability standpoint, having control over your own communications infrastructure is a far better choice than depending on a third-party.