ITWire

Research firm Vanson Bourne quizzed 500 CIOs for the survey, commissioned by Virgin Media Business. The iPhone model received seven percent more of the vote than Samsung's Galaxy model, and the long-time choice for business. Only 10 percent believed that RIM's BlackBerry would be the dominant player in the market in the next five years. Samsung was twice as popular as its nearest rival, HTC.

Virgin Media said: "Despite not even being confirmed yet, two percent of respondents think the rumoured Facebook smartphone will go on to dominate the market. However, signs are less positive for Sony Ericsson as just one percent of respondents believe it'll be the main supplier of smartphones for business come 2017."

If the Facebook phone does materialise and is successful that could be good news for HTC, which as been reported as the company manufacturing the as yet unconfirmed device.

In July, citing "people with knowledge of the matter" Bloomberg reported that Facebook was working with HTC to develop the Facebook Phone for release in mid 2013, that it was developing a modified operating system for the device (but did not say what it was being modified from).

"The companies had intended to release the device as early as the end of this year, and pushed back the timetable to give HTC more time to work on other products, said some of the people, who requested anonymity because the plans aren't public," Bloomberg said.