BlackBerry Out at U.S Climate Agency, iPhone In

Research In Motion's BlackBerry smartphone has struggled to win over U.S. consumers but the Canadian company has long been able to rely on the loyalty of corporate and government clients who depend on its secure email. No more.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, a U.S. federal agency that studies climate and the environment, plans to replace some of its employees' BlackBerrys with Apple iPhones and get rid of the servers that power RIM's smartphones by June.

"It all comes down to economics," Joe Klimavicz, NOAA's chief information officer, said in a phone interview on Friday. "I've got a lot of pressure to cut our operating costs."

RIM charges a fee for use of its servers and data centers, which compress and encrypt email and other sensitive data. The company's early success was due to a reliance on BlackBerry smartphones by lawyers, bankers, politicians and bureaucrats.

But with budgets under pressure and competitors improving their security bone fides, BlackBerry is no longer the only game in town.

(Reuters)