As Internet-enabled cell phones, called smart phones, are embraced by the corporate world, users say the devices allow them to be more productive by giving them access to their e-mail, business contacts, and even corporate data anytime, anywhere.
They also, however, represent a security challenge for corporate IT departments, and a “leash” for executives who can’t seem to get away from their jobs with such a device hooked to their belts or resting in their purses, observers here say.
While there is little agreement about what constitutes a smart phone, the devices generally are regarded as cell phones that also have some feature more typically associated with a personal computer, including the ability to access e-mail, calendar, and contact information, browse the Internet, and run applications that tap into corporate data back at the office. Some also play music and provide GPS data.
BlackBerry and Palm have been the stalwart players in the market, but Apple’s iPhone and others are aiming to steal some of that market share.
Christy Prest, an agent with Keller Williams Realty Spokane [Washington], says her smart phone, a Palm Centro, automatically downloads new real estate listings every morning via the Spokane Multiple Listing Service, and she can view the listings — and get updates to them — from the field all day.
“If I’m with a client and we see a house that’s not on the list, we can call the listing up on the phone,” Prest says.
She also uses the device to organize her address book and sales leads, and the phone’s loan-calculator application comes in handy for estimating loan payments for prospective home buyers, she says.
Prest says her smart phone does the job of three pieces of electronic hardware that she used to carry: a cell phone, a personal digital assistant (PDA), and a device called a black…