In the short time that it has been out in the market, the iPhone has already caused quite a considerable ripple in the consumer communications pond. Already being heralded by some industry pundits as the shape of communications devices to come, the iPhone potentially stands to make a significant impact on society as the iPod did only a few short years ago.

While much of the attention on the iPhone focused on its multimedia based features and capabilities, it also has the potential to become an invaluable aid in business applications. This was signified by no less than Apple executives, who on July 25, 2007 suggested the iPhone’s value as a communications and information solution for corporate use.

As of this writing a number of corporate customers have already begun to utilize the iPhone in the course of their daily activities, with the most common application as an email sending and retrieval device.

This comes as no surprise given that the email client that comes included with the iPhone is considered by many to be the best in its class. The majority of corporate and business users have been able to make the transition

to this functionality fairly easy.

One of the issues which have given the corporate world some cause for concern however is the need for companies to make some modifications to their existing corporate firewalls. This is to allow their iPhone users to be able to access their network. As you can imagine, this has raised some concerns over the potential security risks to their corporate networks. It has understandably led some reluctance on the part of I.T. departments to adopt the iPhone as a viable communications solution.

Given this hesitation, the announcement of Synchronica to introduce support of Microsoft Exchange for the iPhone comes just in the nick of time. Since Microsoft Exchange already allows secure network synchronization, the security concerns are effectively bypassed.

It may be awhile yet before the iPhone becomes a standard fixture in the corporate landscape. The absence of 3rd party applications support in particular has been a significant stumbling block. However, with the recent announcement of Apple that they will be releasing the iPhone software development kit makes it appear that it is only a matter of time before iPhone’s full scale and wider acceptance in the business world.