There are several recent articles about the developing wireless email market. Yahoo News says that Good Tech has bought JP Mobile and the Thur 7 July 2005 Wall Street Journal has a front page section B article (syndicated here) about developing consumer, rather than business, use of wireless email.
From the Yahoo News article:
Pablo Perez-Fernandez, an analyst with ThinkEquity Partners in San Francisco, said Research in Motion controls about 80% of the market for enterprise wireless email software. Good Technology has a roughly 9% market share, with the remainder split up among smaller players including Visto Corp.Seven Networks Inc., both of Redwood City, Calif. Visto and Seven also cater to a growing consumer customer base.
The Wall Street Journal leads with a story about Susan Chevalier, a homemaker and mother of three kids, who wanted a wireless email device from the first time she saw a friend use a BlackBerry for his legal work two years ago. She now uses a Treo 600 from Sprint and:
"In just a minute or two, while I'm waiting for the kids, I can send off a note to my husband, check in with my PTA committee, or book doctors' appointments"
My prediction: wireless email will ultimately be a giveaway with consumer and business wireless data plans. I just don't see it adding enough value to sell broadly to average folks. The average business mobile worker (not senior executives, but average white collar business workers) and average consumers just don't get enough "return on investment" for wireless email. I just don't think Susan is all that typical.
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