Why Push Gmail for Blackberry Is a Big Deal

by admin May 5, 2009 at 8:14 am

We recently had the opportunity to test the Google Apps Connector for the BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) and then talk to Google to find out why this is significant and where it is heading. The basics: this enables “push Gmail,” so you can use Gmail directly on your BlackBerry. Report: it works as advertised. We dug a bit deeper to find out whether this might have implications in the broader mobile market, for devices other than BlackBerry. We also wanted to understand the broader implications in the Web office and webmail market.

Why BlackBerry Matters to Google

Here is the context. This relates to the big battle between Microsoft Office and Google Apps.

· There are 21 million BlackBerry users in 150 countries. Many are senior business people.
· Google is signing up 3,000 business users to Google Apps every day.
· Business guys usually live either on their Blackberry or in Outlook.
· Google wants those business guys to lose that last habit and to live in Gmail.
· Once somebody lives in Gmail, it is relatively easy to gradually entice them into other Google apps.

Read more: readwriteweb.com