Following up on the fixed-mobile convergence topic we covered last week, we had a chance to discuss FMC trends with Vivek Khuller, president and CEO of DiVitas Networks. DiVitas is focused on helping to “unwire” businesses communications using mobile-to-mobile convergence. The company’s MMC solution leverages technologies like Wi-Fi, open source software and smart mobile devices to extend business applications over wireless LANs, hot spots and cellular networks. It is also appliance-agnostic.

One concept Khuller advanced was the idea of “corridor warriors” – suggesting that even workers who typically spend most of their work hours in the office can also benefit from FMC/MMC. He cited a 2006 Yankee Research report that estimates about 75% of corridor warriors are limited to a desktop phone and don’t have access to mobility. But based on his company’s ROI modeling, an MMC solution can achieve an operating cost benefit to even office assistants and IT staff in as few as three to five months — including the cost of the premise-based MMC infrastructure and mobile handsets.

When speaking of handsets, Khuller noted that one particular challenge for an FMC/MMC enterprise solution is integrating so many variants of mobile handsets. A handset supplier’s mobile device product life is typically six to 12 months, and the shelf life of a business mobile handset is, on average, less that 24 months. Consequently, any solution supplied to the enterprise must quickly adapt to new handsets, new software revisions, and support multiple operating systems like those supplied on a Microsoft, Linux, or Symbian base. Khuller suggests that sustaining cost-effective upgrades in a dynamic handset environment coupled with the ongoing changes in the Wi-Fi, IP-PBX, and cellular networks is a complex task, and a task that requires a sustainable underlying approach to development.

Our analysis: As with many technology lifecycles, it looks like the introductory innovations for FMC/MMC will likely happen first within enterprise premises-based solutions. Once some of the technology challenges are resolved and carriers start to lose market share to private solutions, maybe the carriers will finally pick up the pace of FMC/MMC deployment.

Steve Taylor is president of Distributed Networking Associates and publisher/editor-in-chief of Webtorials. Larry Hettick is a principal analyst at Current Analysis.