Have we pulled the plug on the enterprise yet?

Some of most prestigious names in the UK mobile market, including bosses from Vodafone, Symbian, Intel and Microsoft, met today to discuss the future of the 'Unplugged Enterprise' in a debate chaired by our own Tony Hallett, Editor of silicon.com at the European Technology Forum's Technology Summit 2003 in London.

The roll out of public Wi-Fi hotspots was one subject which came in for scrutiny - particularly whether it has been overhyped.

Peter Wissinger, director of the mobile devices division at Microsoft, said: "This industry has been overhyped for a very long time. Only in this last few months have some of the building blocks actually started to fall into place."

However, Rick Skett, director and country manager for Intel UK & Ireland, countered suggestions that the excitement surrounding Wi-Fi is just hype.

"I don't think this is a case of Wi-Fi enjoying some kind of honeymoon period," he said. "This is a great time for Wi-Fi. The thing we are seeing with users is once you have used a wireless LAN you will never look back. Already there are 3,000 wireless hotspots across the UK in places such as Texaco garages and Starbucks coffee shops, the model is there and it's growing."

"It's not about ISPs, it's about the private enterprises. Why are Starbucks doing this? So people stay longer. If I want to get a coffee then I'm going to go to Starbucks because I can get connected."

However, David Levin, CEO of Symbian, was less enthusiastic. He said many businesses rolling out Wi-Fi services are gambling on something which will ultimately fail to deliver revenues for them.

"Some of the businesses are taking punts, and some of them are taking bad punts. If you are running a coffee house do your really want somebody dawdling on their email over two cups of coffee."

But whether it's in coffee shops, petrol stations, train stations or service stations Skett insisted that businesses owe it to their clients, contacts and employees to make the most of wireless networking.

"Twelve months ago it was acceptable to be on the road for 48 hours without responding to emails, but it's not now," he said. "People expect a three-hour response time to emails now."

Peter Kelly, president enterprise networks at Nortel Networks, agreed that Wi-Fi is very much about the here and now, but aired words of warning about the work which still needs to be done before we get too carried away.

As well as raising concerns about security he also said issues such as roaming and billing also need a lot more work before we see a truly unplugged enterprise.