So far, the iPhone has made headlines as a “cool gadget” that makes calls, plays music, finds your nearest restaurant, and even plays farting pranks on your friends. But it would be unfair to dismiss this device as a pure gadget without any business purpose.

There are over 1,000 apps in the business category in the App Store. They range from small applications for logging business expenses and car mileage to large productivity applications that connect to corporate CRM implementations for leads and account management whilst on the move.

Whilst Apple has already enabled many enterprise features like Exchange Active sync and Remote corporate connectivity, many big companies like Salesforce.com and Oracle are providing iPhone apps to their customers so that enterprises can be more effective in conducting business on the move. In addition, many third party vendors are building apps for services like Microsoft Dynamics and SAP ERP amongst others.

If you have home grown CRM & ERP solutions running your business, you can still develop iPhone & iPod Touch solutions for your mobile force, or for your user base. Apple’s iPhone development program provides a simple & intuitive development platform to develop these applications, and deploy them for most enterprise level systems.

Some of the apps that we found being marketed on the App Store include:

• Saleforce Mobile
• Oracle Mobile Sales Assistant
• Oracle Mobile Sales Forcast
• Oracle Business Approvals for Sales Managers
• Oracle Business Approvals for Managers

Companies have only begun to understand the business benefits a device like the iPhone can bring them, and it is only a matter of time before more enterprise level apps are seen on the market. The iPhone is maturing, and corporates are gearing themselves to leverage its power.