Is the iPhone a threat to the BlackBerry?

Apple’s newest iPhone is said to be ready to take on the business world. We’ll take a look into just how ready the iPhone really is to break into this exclusive market ruled by the BlackBerry.

The iPhone caught on very quickly as a consumer grade all-in-one device that redefined how people defined mobile phones. It was only a matter of time before the business world recognized the value in the features available through the iPhone. Other manufactures, including BlackBerry, have released products to emulate the iPhone. Some of these products aren't too shabby, but most fall short of delivering the iPhone experience.

New features of the iPhone 3Gs make the device friendlier to the business environment such as the ability to sync with Exchange servers, the inclusion of a Cisco IPSec VPN client and the support for SSL/TLS. Other features Apple is pushing is the ability to remote wipe the device from Exchange, the built in encryption and the ability to apply policy’s to administer the iPhone.

Despite these additions to the iPhone, some business owners are still wary of switching to a device that has been labeled as a consumer grade device. Apple’s “App Store” is a large part of this. Even though the apps available for purchase or download need to be approved by Apple, they can still have security holes in them and many of the apps available aren’t business oriented which may lead to distraction instead of production.

There is one major flaw of the iPhone that has recently come to light. The iPhone itself is easily hacked and the encryption broken in less than 2 minutes when in the hands of a knowledgeable hacker with easily downloadable freeware. This of course requires physical access to the device. This flaw alone is enough for many companies to remove the iPhone from consideration.

With the capabilities of the device and the ease of creating proprietary applications for the device, the iPhone has turned out to be a fairly good competitor in the business market. But to answer my initial question, is the iPhone a threat to BlackBerry? Not at this stage of the game. The iPhone is a great device and may get some market share from small business owners who don’t have email servers or aren’t worried about the information stored on the device.
The device is right at the cusp of being a great business grade device that offers much more than BlackBerry. But it still needs some work. The hardware itself is quite capable, but the onboard security is going to cost iPhone the Enterprise market share where there is no compromise in data security. But upcoming OS releases of the iPhone will fix these errors and oversights. The iPhone is going to become a force that BlackBerry will have to deal with.