Mobile e-mail market heats up

An announcement from a rival company may put some pressure on Research in Motion and its BlackBerry platform in the world of mobile e-mail.

Good Technology last week announced a carrier deal with Cingular Wireless, in which Cingular plans to offer the GoodLink service on a Palm One Treo 650 device and the Siemens SX66 Pocket PC device. The Treo 650 includes access to Cingular's EDGE wireless data network for faster e-mail, attachment downloads and Web browsing, Cingular says.

The Siemens SX66 Pocket PC includes an Intel 400 MHz processor and includes the Windows Mobile operating system and a slide-out keypad. Cingular says that GoodLink customers will also be able to connect to their e-mail while overseas with these two quad-band devices.

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An announcement from a rival company may put some pressure on Research in Motion and its BlackBerry platform in the world of mobile e-mail.

Good Technology last week announced a carrier deal with Cingular Wireless, in which Cingular plans to offer the GoodLink service on a Palm One Treo 650 device and the Siemens SX66 Pocket PC device. The Treo 650 includes access to Cingular's EDGE wireless data network for faster e-mail, attachment downloads and Web browsing, Cingular says.

The Siemens SX66 Pocket PC includes an Intel 400 MHz processor and includes the Windows Mobile operating system and a slide-out keypad. Cingular says that GoodLink customers will also be able to connect to their e-mail while overseas with these two quad-band devices.

The GoodLink service provides continuous two-way wireless synchronization of Microsoft Outlook functions, including e-mail, calendar, contacts, notes and tasks, Good says. Other features include FIPS- (Federal Information Processing Standard-) certified security (including AES data encryption), over-the-air device provisioning, and its "Zero-IT-Touch" activation and third-party application upgrade technology.

Cingular plans to sell GoodLink as an end-to-end service for $44.99 per month for unlimited data, along with a qualified voice plan, the company says. Customers must also buy a $1,500 one-year Starter Pak and one-time $99 per user GoodLink Client Access license, in addition to the devices supported ($399 for the Treo 650 and $499 for the Siemens SX66). The Starter Pak includes one full year of IT support from Good Technology, as well as "enterprise-grade support" from Cingular's business customer care group. More details on the announcement are available at http://www.cingular.com/goodlink.

The Good announcement comes on the heels of the Nextel/Visto announcement, in which Nextel said it plans to provide its Mobile Email Enhanced service (via Visto's ConstantSync technology) that offers real-time access to a user's e-mail, contact lists and calendar items. The Nextel service will work on new Java-based Nextel phones, including the Motorola i605, i335 and i275. (See http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/mobile/2005/0530mobile2.html for more about the Nextel/Visto announcement.)
 
With more devices available for real-time wireless mobile e-mail access, it should be interesting to see whether customers who already use BlackBerry devices will be tempted to make the switch to a different device and service, or whether RIM comes out with some additional features or device capabilities. The company has announced the BlackBerry Connect program, which aims to add BlackBerry functionality on different devices.

For example, RIM recently announced the availability of BlackBerry Connect on Sony Ericsson's P910i device, which Globe Telecom plans to release in the Philippines for its customers. In addition, Singapore Telecommuincations  (SingTel) announced the P910i for its customers in Singapore.

Features include push-based wireless e-mail, wireless reconciliation and attachment viewing through the BlackBerry Enterprise Server, and the BlackBerry Internet Service. The P910i device includes support for voice calls, text and picture messaging, e-mail and a PDA organizer. It has a camera phone (with video recorder capabilities), a 262,000-color touch screen, and uses the Symbian OS version 7.0 operating system and the UIQ user interface.