Communications Day reports that mobile technologies are strongly entrenched in Australian small and medium businesses, with up to 80% of SMBs currently providing mobile connections to employees or reimbursing work-related mobile expenses, according to a new report from IDC.

The analyst firm predicts that along with the increased data speeds, mobile spending in the SMB market will continue to rise. IDC’s report, ‘Australia Small and Medium-Sized Business Wireless and Mobility Technology Adoption, 2008: The Need for Speed’, revealed that this trend is stimulated by the increased usage of mobile data. It also examined the widespread availability of mobile broadband over 3G/HSDPA, which led IDC to believe that using business applications on a mobile-enabled laptop at an affordable cost has become possible for a large number of SMBs.

“Hardware vendors are starting to offer well priced 3G/HSDPA enabled notebooks and competition between providers is driving mobile data cost down. Software vendors are still largely missing in the picture but are starting to offer mobile business applications optimised for high-speed mobile networks as they realize the huge potential of the mobility market,” said IDC research manager Jean-Marc Annonier.

According to the report, nearly 80% of SMBs are already using mobile email or are planning to use it in the next 12 months. IDC expects a strong increase in mobile email usage as it becomes more widespread among knowledge workers.

In addition, Mr Annonier said that coverage is a critical factor of churn in the area, even more important than cost. “The last thing business owners want to experience after investing in mobile technology is to find out that mobile employees aren’t able to work due to a lack of coverage,” he said.