Smartphones offer lure for businesses

New smartphones from O2 and other vendors this year could boost corporate interest in a product category that has often failed to meet business needs, according to analysts.

O2 will launch the second generation of its XDA smartphone this Saturday, 1 November. The XDA II is based on Windows Mobile 2003 for Pocket PC Phone Edition and integrates a tri-band phone, Bluetooth wireless connectivity, and a camera. The product also has 128MB RAM - twice as much as the original XDA - and a faster processor. It will cost £349 with a 12-month contract.

Sendo last week announced its Sendo X smartphone, based on Symbian and due to ship this quarter. And in November Sony Ericsson will launch its P900 smartphone, which can record video clips and is based on Symbian OS 7.0 and the UIQ user interface. Meanwhile, Siemens is gearing up to launch its SM1 handset.

Industry watchers said the smartphone sector needed compelling new products.

Although spending on mobile devices grew 27 percent year on year for the most recent quarter, most growth was in the standalone PDA market, where HP performed especially strongly, according to research firm Canalys.

Systems such as the German Medion PDA, used in conjunction with GPS for location-based services, have also been driving growth.

Mark Robinson, business manager for technology distributor Hugh Symons, said interest had waned due to lack of innovation. "The lack of new products hasn't inspired end-users. That may change with the new products coming online. On the handheld computing side units are flying out. There's a lot of location-based services going into the haulage and shipping industries."

Chris Jones, senior analyst at Canalys, said, "There haven't been the launches of new smartphone models to boost the market [recently]. But there are a number of smartphone models coming online that should boost take-up."