Smartphones that Work for Business

Carl Weinschenk, who edits our Unified Communications Edge site, asked several analysts which smartphones were best for business. Clearly, Carl found that these devices -- and others that didn't quite make the list -- will play a central role in both unified communications and business computing.

Some responders went with the cool and some with the functional. The bottom line is that there is no shortage of useful and fun phones for business people as well as consumers.

Participants in this slideshow were two Gartner analysts -- Carolina Milanesi, research director of Mobile Devices for Technology and Service Provider Research, and Ken Dulaney, a vice president and distinguished analyst. Other participants were Chris Silva, senior analyst for enterprise infrastructure at Forrester Research; Allen Nogee, principal analyst for In-Stat; Kevin Burden, practice director for mobile devices for ABI Research; and Avi Greengart, research director for consumer devices, mobile devices/digital home for Current Analysis.

Not surprisingly, Research in Motion was the big winner of our informal poll. All but one of the analysts chose at least one BlackBerry device. Among those chosen were the Bold 9700 and the Curve 8900. Two analysts chose Nokias – the E71 and N900 Maemo. The Apple iPhone was chosen by two analysts. Single votes were cast for the Google/HTC Nexus One, the LG eXpo, the HTC Fuze, the Palm Pre and the HTC Touch Pro 2.