According to a Reuters report, citing Standard Chartered bankers in Asia, the lender has decided to change its standard corporate communications device - replacing the presently-in-use RIM BlackBerry handsets with the Apple iPhone.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity, because of company policy, a Singapore-based spokeswoman for Standard Chartered said that the London-based banks decision to switch over to iPhone will eventually see thousands of bankers giving up the RIM handset for business communication on the go.

Noting that Standard Chartered will foot the monthly bill for business-related telephone and data services availed by its corporate users who switch over to iPhone, the spokeswoman said: "It's a group-wide initiative involving wholesale and consumer banks globally."

Though the spokeswoman added that she had no information either about the number of the Asia-focused bank's 75,000 employees who have already switched over to the iPhone or about the timeline for the completion of the switchover, she still said that the process of the switching over of corporate email services from BlackBerry to iPhone began nearly a month back.

In the opinion of financial professionals and IT analysts, since BlackBerry has thus far been the standard business communications device issued by bankers at other financial institutions like HSBC Holdings Plc and Morgan Stanley, a more comprehensive switchover to some other handset will take time, mainly due to security concerns.