US corporations' spending on wireless voice and mobile data services will exceed business spending on all wireline voice and data services by 2010, reports, high-tech market research firm, In-Stat. According to In-Stat's recent research, the arrival of this inflection point means that wireless carriers and network managers must increasingly opt for programs in which business managers pay and manage their employees' wireless services.

Unlike wireline services for which the employer always pays, roughly half of business organizations currently require employees to negotiate directly with wireless operators to provide voice and data services. Allocating resources to convince corporate customers to pay for employees' wireless service would be money well spent. What's more, corporate-liable and individually liable business users are disproportionately profitable for carriers compared to consumer users.

"Deciding how a firm pays for its wireless bills is a decision typically made at relatively senior levels," says Bill Hughes, In-Stat analyst. "Convincing a firm to change its approach is not the kind of decision that a salesperson can make at an initial meeting. However, reaching senior managers to convince them that wireless expenses need to be actively managed is in the interest of the customer organization
and the wireless operator. Managing wireline expenses has been standard practice for decades. It is time to employ the same techniques for wireless expenses for the same reasons."

Recent research by In-Stat found the following:

• The majority of revenue today for US wireless operators comes from business users and retail customers that use their phone at least partially for business. These subscribers have higher average revenue per user (ARPU) than personal-use only customers, and contribute the significant majority of the profit for wireless operators.
• Current wireless operators need to anticipate new competitors that are targeting these highly profitable business customers.

The research, "Wireless Business Use: The Overlooked Profit Machine", covers the market for wireless services in the US business market. It includes analysis of the US business wireless services market with recommendations for carriers on how to compete successfully for the wireless market's most lucrative customers. It also contains insight into how corporate customers pay for wireless services, and provides a forecast for US business wireless spending through 2011. For more information on this research or to purchase it online, please visit: http://email.in-stat.com/cgi-bin4/DM/y/e8xq0M3aZa0K560EHF50Ec