CommonTime Releases Mobility Whitepaper

CommonTime, the global Lotus Notes mobility specialist, has released a Whitepaper addressing the challenge companies have in formulating and delivering the right mobility strategy. Businesses looking to achieve successful mobility solutions need to provide not only mobile messaging, but also tailored mobile Line of Business (LOB) applications, the company says, while always addressing issues of security, manageability, reliability and scalability.
Microsoft’s System Center Mobile Device Manager (MDM) provides the core infrastructure needed for a successful mobility solution, the company says.  CommonTime has partnered with Microsoft to combine key elements of its industry leading Lotus Notes/Domino mobility solution, mSuite, for Windows Mobile devices with MDM.
CommonTime’s mSuite Domino Connector for MDM utilizes the rich infrastructure provided by MDM and provides Lotus Notes Messaging and Application support for Windows Mobile devices. According to CommonTime, the result fully integrates components of its mSuite product with MDM and provides a simple, easy to manage solution for companies to deploy Windows Mobile devices without having to upgrade their existing IBM infrastructure. Businesses can provide a mobility solution for Lotus Notes users quickly and cost-effectively whilst at the same time giving employees the rich functionality they want and keeping company data secure.
You can obtain a copy of the Whitepaper by emailing holly.hayley@commontime.com

CTIA: emoze Goes HTML

Mobile email company emoze has upgraded its push-email solution to handle HTML emails. Using the new HTML interface, emoze users will see a more familiar, web-like view of their emails, including pictures, logos, layout designs, signatures and other visuals.
Building on its recently-released ISP solution, emoze says the HTML upgrade takes mobile email one step closer to supporting online social communities such as Facebook in the near future.
“emoze’s commitment to bringing its users fresh, easy, fast and efficient push email is unparalleled,” says emoze CEO, Eitan Linker. “Making use of HTML as a viewing platform ensures a heightened user experience. Push email, contacts and calendar information are now complete with superior attachments, logos, pictures and signatures, as a user would view from their PC.”
emoze’s range of business and personal solutions are available for download online at www.emoze.com emoze is available for mobile users with Yahoo!, Gmail, Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft Exchange or Lotus Notes email accounts and can be accessed from a wide range of applicable mobile devices, Smartphones and PDAs.
emoze has also used the show to announce to the US market its first corporate solution, the Enterprise Edition and an extension of its mass market offering, the ISP solution.

Synchronica Secures Funds for Emerging Markets Push

Mobile email and synchronization solutions provider Synchronica plc has raised an additional $3.9 million (£1.97 million) to further fund its push into emerging markets with its mobile email and backup solutions. Synchronica’s Mobile Gateway solution enables operators to offer push email on mass market handsets for both consumer and business users, while Mobile Backup offers a backup and restore service for the personal information stored on devices.
This latest placing of new shares to institutional and private investors is in addition to funding secured in January and brings the 2008 investment in the company to $7.5 million. The funds will be used primarily to expand Synchronica's sales and support functions in emerging markets, including the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
The investment comes as Synchronica makes significant inroads into emerging markets. One mobile operator has already launched Mobile Gateway, and another 15 are currently trialling the software.
According to Synchronica, Mobile Gateway 3.5 works with more than 3 billion of the phones in use around the world today, including Smartphones and mass-market devices, making it ideal for emerging markets where low-cost handsets represent the vast majority of devices. With Mobile Gateway 3.5, the company says, even the most basic phones can receive email via an email-to-SMS gateway which shows header and body text in a text message.
Another benefit for subscribers in emerging markets, where PC penetration is low, is that they can now sign up for the service from their handset via WAP, removing the need to register using a PC.
Mobile Backup is also ideally suited to these regions, the company says, since the mobile phone is increasingly becoming the primary repository of choice for social and business contact information. Customers can sign up for Mobile Backup via a straightforward WAP interface or through a simple SMS signup procedure. A built-in client provisioning module automatically configures the phone.
Informa predicts that there will be 4.81 billion mobile phone subscribers by 2012, with the majority of the next billion subscribers coming from emerging markets where PC and fixed-line penetration is low, and consumers rely on their mobile phones for communication.
“This new round of funding is important because it allows us to continue to strengthen our efforts in emerging markets,” says Synchronica CEO, Carsten Brinkschulte. “We have a robust pipeline of prospects in these regions and a first-rate solution that truly offers mobile email for everyone, regardless of which phone they use. With these funds, and our recent announcement of the strategic partnership with Brightstar to distribute Mobile Gateway in over 50 countries across six continents, we are well positioned to offer mobile operators a ‘BlackBerry for the rest of us.’”

Momail Launches in Polish

Mobile email provider Momail has revealed that its mobile email service is now available in the local language in Poland. In less than two minutes, the company says, customers can set up a Momail account via their mobile or PC to have a mobile email solution on their handsets which is as easy as SMS to use. 
Mobile penetration in Poland is three times that of PCs. Additionally, the company notes, there are now more than 1 million Polish people who can now use Momail's mobile email offering as their main communication tool, in their native language.
“After Sweden and the UK, we are excited to offer a localized version of Momail to users in Poland,” says Momail CEO, Roger Grönberg. “Our technology optimizes every message and attachment, without destroying the original, while minimising the amount of data and thus the cost of mobile data by up to 99.9%."
Momail does not require special clients or software in the mobile, thus minimising download and installation problems. Momail currently works on more than 1,000 different handset models. Momail is free of charge and works on all mobiles with built-in email support. The service is available in the UK, in all Nordic countries and in Poland. The company says that many more countries will be added this year, beginning with Germany.

SEVEN Expands Latvian Offering

Push email software company SEVEN has partnered with Latvijas Mobilais Telefons (LMT), Latvia’s biggest mobile network operator, to provide LMT customers with access to their consumer email accounts on their mobile phone with Tiešpasts, powered by SEVEN’s Consumer Edition solution.
LMT customers currently have access to SEVEN’s enterprise mobile email solution, making it easy for users to monitor their work email accounts away from the office. Now, SEVEN is providing its Consumer Edition solution to LMT customers, allowing them the same instant access to consumer email accounts from popular Internet email providers such as Google, inbox.lv, delfi.lv, and apollo.lv.
“By extending our mobile email solution to include our Consumer Edition solution with LMT we are furthering our mission to provide mobile email to everyone,” says SEVEN CEO, Ross Bott. “We understand the need for an easy solution to access consumer email accounts on a vast array of devices. We are excited to offer our own consumer email solution to LMT customers, giving them the access they want on their existing mobile phones.”
SEVEN says its consumer mobile email solution is easy to access and use. To access email accounts, customers choose the personal mobile email icon, and enter their username and password once for continued access. SEVEN has simplified the mobile email user interface to encourage usability and adoption of its solution. Customers will also have access to both their personal and work email accounts on their mobile phone, as well as access to their contacts and calendar appointments.
“Mobile email has been steadily gaining popularity among both businesses and consumers for some time,” says LMT Press Secretary, Elīna Lidere. “We are happy to extend our own services to include mobile email access to consumer email accounts, in addition to SEVEN’s enterprise email services they are already offering our customers.”
SEVEN’s Consumer Edition is available for € 4.26 (£3.20) per month, and the Enterprise Edition for
€ 7.11 per month.

emoze Comes to the Nseries

Mobile push-email provider emoze has revealed that Nokia Nseries handsets to be released in 2008 will be ‘emoze ready’, with emoze push-email software available to download from the ‘Download!’ folder .
Emoze points out that its application is not limited to Nokia Nseries users. moze mobile email is available to tens of millions of mobile users with a compatible phone and a data package. The application can be downloaded from the emoze website.
emoze notes that all messages are stored behind the firewall in a home or corporate network, and are accessed only when they reach the right mobile device or PC. This not only saves the user connectivity-related costs but also delivers increased battery efficiency, memory use and CPU.
“With the Nokia offering, emoze is upping its game,” says emoze CEO, Eitan Linker. “In 2008, anyone with a capable device and data package can capitalise on emoze, and extend their email experience from desktop to device. As ever, emoze will continue to offer the push-experience anytime, anywhere.”

Blackberry Debuts in Russia

Russian network operators MTS and Vimpelcom have announced that two-year negotiations with Blackberry maker Research In Motion (RIM) and with the FSB (the former KGB) have been successfully completed.
The bottleneck was e-mail encryption and the FSB. The FSB was requesting access to the Blackberry e-mail encryption code, while RIM was unwilling to provide code for decryption. But a compromise solution has been reached. For Russian users, a Blackberry server will be installed not on the client side, as anywhere in the rest of the world, but on the mobile carrier side. And Russian enforcement agencies will be able to monitor the traffic. All Russian telecom companies are required by law to have a so-called SORM (System of Operative Investigative Activities) system to provide enforcement bodies with access to monitoring voice and data traffic.
MTS and Vimpelcom have each been granted permission to import into Russia 300 Blackberry 8800s, 300 Blackberry 7290s, 480 Blackberry 8700Gs, as well as the Blackberry Enterprise Server v4.1.
The third largest Russian mobile operator, MegaFon, has announced a competing service called MegaSync. This also allows users to receive e-mail on their mobile with online data encryption, but does not require the user to use a specific device. The service is based on Nokia Intellisync technology. It is currently available on seven Nokia business mobile and soon will be available on over 100 mobile phones and PDAs from various manufacturers.

1,000 Device Milestone for Momail

Mobile email provider Momail reports that it has become the first vendor to support more than 1,000 different mobile devices. Momail says the figures is four times more than its closest competitor. 
Examples of the latest and upcoming models compatible with Momail are the Apple iPhone, the LG KU990 Viewty, the Motorola MOTORAZR V9, and the SonyEricsson  K660i, W380i and W890i.
"In UK the GPS and the digital photo frame has been selected as this year's ‘must-have’ Christmas gifts, but if we count the number of units sold during the holiday season, the mobile phone will win again this year,” says Momail CEO, Roger Grönberg. “We estimate that more than 300 million mobile phones will be sold worldwide this quarter. In the UK alone, approximately 6 million handsets will be sold, and Momail functions on almost all of them.” 
Of the more than 1.1 billion mobile phones that will be sold this year, more than 80%  include  built-in email support, and Momail says it intends to be first choice in markets where it is available. Today, Momail is available in the five Nordic countries and the UK, and will launch in Germany and Poland “very soon”. The company says it will continue to expand its offering across more countries throughout 2008.
“Momail makes it very easy to get started, and its patented technology optimizes every email for each mobile's specific requirements, thus saving an average of 82% of the data traffic to the mobile,” says Grönberg. “Momail is the fastest and most cost effective mobile communication solution available today."
Momail is free of charge and works on all mobiles with built-in email support. Users can register free of charge here.

Microsoft Exchange Push Email for the iPhone

Synchronica, the mobile synchronisation and device management company, says that UK iPhone owners can turn their new handset into a business phone by adding a secure corporate email service free of charge, with just a few clicks.
Synchronica says it is the only vendor offering a live solution allowing iPhones owners to receive push email from Microsoft Exchange accounts, without requiring additional software to be installed on the iPhone, or behind the corporate firewall. Synchronica is offering a free 60-day trial if its Mobile Gateway solution for UK iPhone users, following a successful trial which has been running in the US since August. More than 10,000 US iPhone users have already signed up for the Mobile Gateway trial and, says Synchronica, have seamlessly incorporated their new handsets into their business life, using mobile email.
Synchronica says that Mobile Gateway, which provides a link between the iPhone’s built-in email client and Microsoft Exchange, is the perfect complement to iTunes for ensuring fast, secure synchronisation of all business data. While iTunes synchronises calendar and contacts with Microsoft Outlook, Mobile Gateway keeps iPhone connected to corporate email when the user has left the office. It provides tight integration between the iPhone and Microsoft Exchange, and automatically delivers emails to the built-in email client of the iPhone, including support for folders and attachments. Emails sent from the iPhone via Mobile Gateway automatically appear in the ‘Sent Items’ folder of the user’s Exchange account as if they had been sent from the user’s PC.
To take up the trial, iPhone users need should head for the Synchronica website and register their iPhone with Synchronica’s Mobile Gateway. At the end of the 60-day trial period, users will be migrated to a commercially-supported service.
“I know that those who have finally got their hands on the iPhone in the UK are going to love their new handset just as much I love mine,” says Synchronica CEO, Carsten Brinkschulte. “The iPhone is an iconic device with an exceptional user experience, and probably the first to deliver the complete web experience on a mobile device. Mobile Gateway closes the main gap in its functionality by connecting the iPhone to corporate Exchange mailboxes. Another reason to leave that Blackberry in the drawer.”

Talking Mobile Email with Emoze

The gremlins seem to be playing havoc with our plans to report from the Symbian Smartphone Show today. The first post from the show which went up just after lunchtime, seems to have disappeared, so here it is again, hopefully not looking too different to the original...
First, to the Emoze stand, where we find the company in bullish mood, with a raft of new announcements. First is the upgrading of its free software that provides secure push email to mobile phones all over the world, to support Google Apps, the packaged collection of Google applications including e-mail, instant messaging, calendar, word processing, spreadsheet and web authoring applications. Google Apps enables consumers and businesses to use their own custom domain names with several Google products, including Gmail. Families, business and educational institutions can create their own domain name for emails with professional addresses like johnsmith@mycompany. Emoze already supports push emails from the Gmail domain.  Now, with the updated emoze version, emails can be pushed to the consumer’s mobile device even from private domains on the Google server.
Second, Emoze Marketing Director Caron Tal tells us, the Enterprise edition of Emoze will launch globally next week. This, as regular readers will recall, is Emoze’s corporate email solution that will be sold in batches of 50 licences at a cost of €500 (£250) for each 50 users per year, a price that significantly undercuts the cost to a corporation of running a fleet of Blackberrys, which Emoze says is around £30 - £50 per month for each device. With such dramatic savings to be had, we suggested, some may find the figures hard to believe. But Tal insists:
“We have no problems in selling it. Once people see it’s better and costs less they are very happy to try it out. It’s secure, and there’s no need to worry about data storage. We have a couple of companies trying it in Israel, and they are over the moon.
Finally, says Tal, Emoze will launch a Java-based email solution before the end of the year. The current Emoze solution runs off the native client of each handset. Tal insists that email attachments on a mobile look much better when seen via the handset’s native client, but says:
“There is a huge mass market out there who will only download a Java application because it’s so simple; one click and it’s all configured for you. We said to ourselves that we were limiting ourselves to a couple of million users when we could probably have a billion. That’s why we’re doing it.”

CommonTime Revamps Partner Programe

CommonTime, the wireless push Lotus Notes email and enterprise mobility solutions provider, has strengthened its Partner Program to provide partners with enhanced opportunities to identify and win new business. The program offers access to market-leading wireless mobility solutions, high gross profit margins, technical training and joint marketing programs.
The improved and streamlined program features emphasis on CommonTime's ongoing commitment to its partners selling and supporting its complete line of mobility solutions worldwide.
The CommonTime Partner Program includes several new offerings, including extra margin for sales opportunity registration and the availability of Marketing Development Funds (MDF) to support events, sponsorships, advertising and marketing activities.
All partners also have access to a Partner Portal, a site devoted to the provisioning of partner material, including sales tools, marketing materials, training information, and technical documentation. The program is segmented into two tiers, each carrying a differentiated level of sales commitment and technical training requirements.
“As the mobile data and applications market evolves, CommonTime wishes to create an environment for its partners where they have the best chance to create revenue and provide the best customer experience" says CommonTime Head of Marketing, Ollie Omotosho. “Partners play a vital role in CommonTime's ability to reach and support a broad spectrum of enterprise customers. Our combined strengths enable our customers to implement solutions that will meet their evolving mobility needs."
There’s more information on the Partner Program on the CommonTime website.

Emoze Targets Corporates with Low-cost Push Email Solution

Mobile push email company Emoze plans to launch a corporate version of its push email service before the end of the year, and claims the cost to corporations will be a fraction of what it costs to run a fleet of Blackberrys.
In a private briefing in London yesterday, Emoze CEO Benny Ballin told Mobile Marketing that the solution would be sold in batches of 50 licences at a cost of €1 (£0.67) per user per year. In comparison, said Ballin, the price to run a Blackberry is around £30 - £50 per month for each device. The huge difference, Ballin explained, comes from the fact that the Blackberry system relies on storing the message on Blackberry’s servers, something that is not required in the Emoze system.
“All the leading mobile email providers like Blackberry and Intellisinc all use the same store and forward mechanism” said Ballin. “70% of RIM’s revenue comes from hardware, the servers and the storage capacity.” 
The high cost of most mobile email services, Balin believes, has held the market back, forcing many large corporations to restrict Blackberry deployment to key employees.
“There are 3 billion mobile subscribers and 2.5 billion email accounts, but only around 12 million mobile email users” Ballin pointed out.
Ballin also claimed that a significant amount of Emoze users are former Blackberry users who are using the Emoze solution on their Blackberry handset.
“We used to say we are not competing with Blackberry, but this is no longer true, because many Blackberry users are replacing their solution with Emoze, so we are cannibalising their population” said Ballin.
Ballin also told Mobile Marketing that Emoze is in contact with a leading handset manufacturer to pre-load the Emoze push email service within a matter of months.
“I can’t reveal who, but we are talking about the biggest guys, and I told you we like Symbian” said Balin. (Go figure – Ed)
Emoze is also planning a number of ISP offerings with key ISPs around the world. The first is for Gmail, and will launch within the next couple of weeks, with more offerings for major ISPs and email providers to follow.
Emoze’s existing personal edition mobile email solution is network-agnostic and can be downloaded on to any phone with an email client from the Emoze WAP download site at: mobile.emoze.com