Nokia aims to connect with UK businesses
Vendor seeks more partners to push its Nokia One software suite
Nokia is looking for additional reseller and integrator partners as part of a three-pronged route to market for its Nokia One software-based services.
Nokia One allows users to check voicemail, access calendars and corporate directories and send and receive email remotely, using any device, technology or form of transmission.
Users can preview subject headers, then call in and listen to their email and reply via Short Message Service.
Nokia wants to add more resellers to its data channel in its enterprise solutions group, formerly called the Nokia internet communications group, which was set up during the summer to target the mobile business data market. It will be in full operation by the end of the year.
The group works with Cap Gemini Ernst & Young in the US and said it is close to agreeing terms with UK integrators.
Fujitsu in the UK has added managed email services to Nokia One and will re-brand it.
Gerhard Romen, head of sales and marketing at Nokia One, said it was important not to over-hype mobility. "Mobilising the enterprise is a clear evolution, not a revolution," he said.
One of the first new reseller additions is Neblus, which has been working with distributor MTV.
"[Neblus] combined IT application knowledge, mobility knowledge and security knowledge. We want VARs that can do relationship management and identify the business benefits for customers, and have the technical skills," Rohen said.
But Nokia has its work cut out if it is to change the way businesses access mobile data, distributors warned.
Brian Jackson, managing director of Now Distribution, said: "It's a great story [to sell], but in the real world people are using voicemail and wireless PDAs to check their email.
"A number of companies have offered similar products but it just hasn't clicked. In the enterprise people are using [the free] Microsoft Outlook for the web and demand hasn't got so bad that users want something else."