The picture is, however, far from uniform across all business sectors. In contrast to the insurance industry, which has been an early adopter of mobile sales force applications, the rest of Hong Kong's financial services sector is more cautious, according to Horace Chow, VP, Sybase Asia Pacific.

"We're seeing significant activity and pilot testing underway in the commercial, retail, cross-border manufacturing, services and public sectors," he said. Bruce Lam, general manager Nokia Hong Kong, also points to real estate agencies as being keen on mobility.

Business warming up

At a business level the drive for competitive advantage through more streamlined processes and increased productivity is at the heart of Hong Kong's budding fondness for enterprise mobility, with senior management often triggering its adoption. Line-of-business managers are now asking for mobile applications according to IDC's Verma, while Chow from Sybase said business users are becoming more involved in the qualifying stages of enterprise mobility projects.

At CLP Hong Kong, which has been an early adopter of mobile solutions to streamline maintenance processes that support its high level of electricity supply reliability, mobility implementation is linked to delivering improved business value.