While a range of converged devices are already emerging, some IT executives would rather see cellular service stabilized and coverage enhanced before getting still more sexy handset choices.

Dale N. Frantz, CIO at Auto Warehousing Co. in Tacoma, Wash., says, "[The] bane of my existence is that people love Treo [handheld] devices, because the push technology for 'always-on' e-mail access is unreliable. The network drops sessions and user credentials between cell towers and creates a significant support burden.

"It seems there haven't been many performance gains in cellular communications," adds Frantz. "I believe that stabilizing the network services is at least as important as delivering the next device that plays 'Yankee Doodle Dandy.' "

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