For several years, we have predicted that this will (finally) be the year enterprise mobility services move beyond simple mobile e-mail. Although we are painfully aware of the slow progress thus far, WebMessenger Tuesday announced a product that may help the enterprise mobility dream move a little closer to reality. WebMessenger announced the commercial availability of WebMessenger Mobile for Microsoft Office Communications Server (OCS). The first-to-market solution extends the Microsoft unified communications platform to BlackBerry and other enterprise mobile devices including those that support Windows Mobile and Symbian. WebMessenger Mobile for Microsoft OCS will be on-display May 13 - 15 at the Wireless Enterprise Symposium in Orlando.

When we spoke with Dan Coole - VP Sales and Marketing at WebMessenger, we asked what has made 2008 the year for advances in enterprise mobility. He said that many technology elements are finally coming together to make it happen. Because of the widespread adoption of mobile e-mail and the emergence of collaboration software and VoIP/IP PBXs, all elements of enterprise convergence are coming together to drive the need and acceptance of mobile unified communications as a required extension of these technologies.

Several other business-case factors are contributing to enterprise mobility advances. First, smart devices like the BlackBerry have helped an increasingly mobile workforce enjoy the advantages of improved productivity. With the proliferation of smartphones, businesses can finally prove that productivity gains can be quantified - proving the increased savings for mobile applications like collaboration across multiple industries.

Second, many companies have gone to the expense of adding collaboration tools like Microsoft OCS and have also widely adopted devices like the BlackBerry as a standard office tool. So bringing the collaboration applications and the mobile devices together helps to bridge a gap in business process that currently exists. In a prepared statement WebMessenger President Joe Naylor said, “WebMessenger currently is the only vendor delivering a solution that fills this gap. We expect demand ... to be extraordinarily high in the coming months, as enterprise adoption of Microsoft OCS and BlackBerrys continue to rise.”

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