I saw that Nokia has made a move to incorporate Microsoft ActiveSync client into future Nokia phones.
If a business has Exchange 2003 installed, most of them are thinking about leveraging the in-built mobility through ActiveSync or OMA. For a lot of small companies with fewer concerns around security, this is often a matter of putting a Front-end server in, then opening a hole in the firewall. Devices are often either personal, or bought on an ad-hoc basis where-ever they're cheapest. The Nokia platform having ActiveSync will be another good device option for E-mail.
However, larger customers with enterprise requirements have had a few issues in the past, which will still need to be addressed before devices running ActiveSync can fulfil the promise of being a serious contender in the corporate space where blackberrys' abound.
All ActiveSync traffic is "pull" initiated, that is, the active sync client kicks off sync, and then contacts the e-mail server through an external hole on the business firewall. Even the proposal of IP based notifications in service pack 2 for exchange 2003 just notifies the device to begin a pull. The device can authenticate using basic (which is easily countered using SSL), but cannot present any other level of authentication such as certificates. The built-in VPN client can be used, but many do not use ISA Server as a corporate VPN termination point. IPSec is often the corporate standard for VPN's ruling out PPTP to other vendor VPN concentrators.
Currently no software vendor offers VPN for Microsoft Smartphone, although I did see Certicomm's Movian client have a go at it with the Sierra VOQ. Don't know what happened to that one.
This raises security concerns for many, especially when two-factor authentication is the norm for getting access to internal services from the net.
To mitigate this, a business can currently purchase private GPRS/3G infrastructure, or use a third party "push" solution (i.e. Blackberry).
I see that some Nokia devices already have a Firewall client on them, which I assume gives the option to terminate into Nokia hardware. How this will integrate with use of ActiveSync will be interesting to see, but if it works, it will be a serious alternative to Microsoft based devices for E-mail.
Blackberrys' strength to business is a clear cut cost model for TCO's. From meetings I've had with telecomm vendors, the cost models of Microsoft smartphones aren't clear from the outset. ROI's for any device are always a bit of a stab in the air.
Based on the recent decisions Nokia are making, I think they are very keen to have their slice of the business pie.
Nokia and Microsoft both will need to encourage data and voice suppliers for the enterprise business to develop a blackberry-esque model for TCO comparison if they want to get more footing in this market.
Neil