Enterprises continue to pump more data outside of the office. In 2006, large companies—those with more than 1,000 employees—are planning to spend 5% to 14% more on mobile computing projects than last year, according to a Baseline survey of readers conducted March 2006. In the following sections, you'll find additional results and analysis from our survey, available exclusively online. Click here to read the main story with the survey results.

The Big Spenders

Who spends the most for mobile? According to our survey, financial services firms are most likely to have spent $1 million or more on mobile projects last year, with a quarter of respondents who identified their organizations as working in the financial services sector falling into this bunch. Across all industries, the $1 million-plus club is more likely than the average firm to support non-PC mobile devices—including smart phones and proprietary gadgets—and is twice as likely to support field-service applications.

Table 1: Percentage of respondents, by industry, whose companies spent $1M or more on mobile projects in 2005

Industry $1M+ spending Financial services 25% Energy/utilities 17% Manufacturing (non-I.T.) 15% Retail 14% Information technology 14% Health care 0%

Source: Baseline survey of 143 I.T. executives whose I.T. organizations support mobile devices

Table 2: Top mobile devices among organizations that spent $1M or more on mobile projects in 2005*

Device $1M+ spending All respondents Standard mobile phones 85% 67% Personal digital assistants 82% 64% Notebook/tablet computers 78% 84% Smart phones that can access e-mail and Web 74% 53% Proprietary/customized mobile devices 30% 9%

* Multiple responses allowed
Source: Baseline survey of 143 I.T. executives whose I.T. organizations support mobile devices

Table 3: Top mobile applications among organizations that spent $1M or more on mobile projects in 2005

Application $1M+ spending All respondents Remote access to e-mail 89% 84% Remote access to corporate network files 78% 60% Personal contact management 74% 56% Field-service applications 63% 32% Customer-facing applications 44% 25% CRM/sales force automation 41% 27% Logistics/tracking 41% 18% Inventory management 41% 23% GPS/maps/geographic information systems 37% 21%

* Multiple responses allowed
Source: Baseline survey of 143 I.T. executives whose I.T. organizations support mobile devices