Smartphones with WiFi: indispensable phone tools

Smartphones with WiFi are rapidly becoming indispensable tools for white collar workers, especially those required to travel locally or internationally. We have used laptops to access WiFi networks at airports, hotels and hotspots for years, but itinerant road warriors are now discovering that smartphones with WiFi can be a more than adequate alternative. In fact many of us no longer pack a laptop when traveling on business.

Several trends converged to tip the scale towards WiFi smart phone adoption. First and foremost was the fact that WiFi networks became ubiquitous. Most of us initially got acquainted with them in our homes and at hotspots. From there they were introduced into small businesses and finally corporate IT departments hopped on the bandwagon. They are robust and simple to set up. The technology is getting better all the time and with the advent of WPA2, security is no longer the concern that it was.

With the proliferation of WiFi networks, we then began to see the emergence of compact dual mode smartphones featuring:

Wi-Fi (802.11b/g) now appears on the spec sheets of nearly all PDAs and smartphones. The trend was given further impetus by the release of the iPhone 3G. It increased the urgency for Nokia, RIM, Palm, HTC, Sony ... to respond and they have. The launch of Google's Android smartphone then added even more legitimacy to the WiFi smart phone as a business phone tool.

Concurrent with these trends has been a frenzy of activity by hundreds and possibly thousands of developers to produce applications for smartphones that piggy back on the explosive growth in Voice over WiFi services. Not only can users conserve their mobile phone minutes, but they also avoid costly roaming charges. But VoWiFi services offer far more than just cheap phone calls to business travelers. They also provide services including presence, conferencing and multi-media communication.

Through having access to the Internet via a WiFi PDA phone, users can avoid the necessity for lugging laptops around. They can access information directly from corporate networks wherever they are and synchronize data without incurring excess 3G download charges. The demand for these capabilities is also increasing as a consequence of the trend toward accessing applications and data from the "cloud." The cost of these activities can be prohibitive for a mobile worker using a capped 3G data plan.

By enabling users to wirelessly connect to the Internet, smartphones with WiFi permit users to remotely access back office applications including sales force automation and CRM systems. Through having access to these systems from wherever an employee is located there is a potential for improved people management and increased productivity.

Peering into the future there is every reason to believe that Wi-Fi networks will continue to spawn, increasing the density of coverage and filling in the remaining gaps in WiFi coverage. The release of enterprise and roaming versions of the IEEE standard should further encourage the use of smartphones with WiFi.

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