Features Added to iPhone
Apple Courts Business Users; Developers Gain Toolkit
Steve Jobs announces new features for the iPhone that Apple hopes will increase sales to businesses.
(By Tony Avelar/Bloomberg)
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Friday, March 7, 2008
Apple said yesterday that it added business features to the iPhone and will let outside developers create programs for it.
Apple will push corporate e-mails to the phone, support Microsoft's Exchange message system and offer new security functions, chief executive Steve Jobs said. Company executives also released details of a software toolkit with which outsiders can write applications.
The moves will help court business users, who have largely shunned the iPhone and limited its appeal to consumers. Apple has said it hopes to sell 10 million iPhones this year, but so far the phone has lagged behind Research in Motion's BlackBerry. Support for popular systems such as Exchange could help win over technology managers at companies.
"The iPhone now fits a lot better in the enterprise and can compete effectively against RIM and Nokia," said Simon Yates, an analyst at Forrester Research in Cambridge, Mass.
Apple released the iPhone in June and sold 4 million through Jan. 15, No. 3 among mobile phones that include e-mail and Web access. Its e-mail features, through services such as Google and Yahoo, have been better suited for consumers
Apple aims to win 1 percent of the mobile-phone market, which may total about 1 billion devices this year, according to Jobs. The company had 6.5 percent of the global market for smartphones in the fourth quarter, less than Finland's Nokia and Research in Motion, said research firm Canalys.
In the United States, Apple's 28 percent market share is No. 2, behind RIM's 41 percent. Palm is No. 3 with 9 percent, Canalys said.
