Apple Teaming Up With Salesforce.com

During the company's quarterly earnings call this week Apple CFO Timothy Cook confirmed that Apple was teaming up with Salesforce.com to ready the software-as-a-service vendor's platform for use on the iPhone.

Salesforce.com vice president of developer marketing Adam Gross confirmed that the companies were working together and said he thinks that the iPhone and other mobile devices are going to revolutionize the way mobile-users do business.

"As the Internet becomes more capable and the devices for accessing the Internet become more ubiquitous, it's not just about the browser on the desktop," said Gross. "Increasingly we see people taking advantage of software-as-a-service from all kinds of devices."

Software-as-a-service, he said, needs to move "beyond the browser."

To accommodate users of the iPhone, Salesforce.com is developing a user interface that will work more gracefully with the device's look and feel. The changes will apply to and benefit other software developed for and hosted on Salesforce.com's platform.

"It's such a capable and powerful Internet device, and a lot of what Salesforce.com has seen in general is the migration of Internet technologies from consumer applications to business applications," said Gross.

"I think we're seeing a similar thing happening with mobile applications where the innovation is starting on the consumer side but will eventually migrate to business applications."

Do you think the iPhone is seroiusly ready for business applications?