The E-Mail Push

wireless e-mail BlackBerry software

In RIM's defense, Motorola isn't the first to challenge it. Nokia's purchase of Intellisync last year was aimed at fueling Nokia's launch into the push e-mail market, but the company has yet to experience anything like the wildfire growth that RIM has accomplished. I attribute RIM's success to the channel; RIM learned early on that partners sell products and services very effectively. Motorola needs to take that into consideration if it wants to push the Good product line with any success. This simple logic applies to Nokia as well. While both Motorola and Nokia are channel players, their message is convoluted when it comes to services, perhaps due to the companies' respective agreements with carriers.

While RIM, Motorola and Nokia aim to wrap up the market, all three companies will need to pay attention to an upstart: Seven, a company whose sole purpose is to bring e-mail to every mobile device at an affordable price. Seven is making a channel play with its enterprise products and has made some serious inroads into the push technology market with major carrier agreements. Seven is currently offering its services via major wireless carriers (T-Mobile, Cingular and Sprint Nextel) and is charging as little as $4.99 a month. That makes the product especially attractive to small businesses, where there will probably be the most significant growth in push technology.

Seven touts simplicity as its uniqueness in the market, and rightly so. Its e-mail server products prove to be very easy to set up and are device-agnostic. The company is offering a channel program that makes a lot of sense for the typical VAR selling to the small and medium enterprise market, with lots of opportunity to reach into the enterprise.

From the technical side of the equation, the Test Center is looking to test the RIM, Motorola and Nokia platforms, but the companies have been less than responsive. Hopefully that isn't an indication of their commitments to the channel or an indication of platform concerns. Only time will tell.

Who do you think will win the market? Let me know at (516) 562-7485 or vis e-mail at [email protected].