Yes the 5 smallest IT companies on the face of the earth are going to convince enterprises that Apple is the right solution for their business.

Companies may someday switch to mac's but I can tell you it won't be anytime in the next 5 years and by then Steve will be gone and Apple will again be looked at as a company that can't do anything right.

"Apple's strong marks in security, features, performance, usability and reliability are indicative of the qualities customers' value when purchasing hardware and operating system software," Yankee said.

No doubt those are all true, but the more Macs that are installed means the more people that will be out to write malicious cold for them. This will be interesting to see in the next couple years how much market share Apple can grab and how they will cope with the soon to be growing number of threats to their "secure" operating system. I might just have to switch myself depending on how they deal with this.

(note: Sorry for the novel, but I thought it was important. I had to split it into 2 comments.)

"small market-share security" is a common claim from many an Apple skeptic, and I'm not necessarily dismissing it outright, but I think it's shortsighted to believe that the long-standing practical security of OSX versus that of Windows 98/XP is solely a direct result of low market-share. I'm sure as more people adopt Apple computers, OSX is going to become a more desired target for the types of exploits that we commonly see on Windows, but I believe it will provide a much better defense.

First of all, an important part of OSX's security is the fact that it is based on many proven, mature open source technologies that have been refined over many years. It underpinnings were taken from NextStep, which itself was built from rock-solid, open source UNIX components such as the Mach/XNU kernel, BSD system elements like the network stack, virtual file system, process model, and device driver API. Apple also uses and contributes to many open source projects including GCC, LLVM, CUPS, WebKit, D-Trace, Kerberos, I/O Kit, Apache, OpenSSL, OpenSSH, OpenLDAP, gnumake, gnuzip, zlib, subversion, MySql, and many more.

Now obviously at different levels in the OSX architecture, there is a lot of proprietary code as well, but their diverse use of mature, open source code insures that a significant portion of the system has been continually subjected to peer-review from outside developers, security experts, penetration testing companies, etc. Many of these projects are robust and poplar, being actively used in dozens of other projects, and so are continually refined and patched for bugs and possible exploits. Compare this to Windows XP, whose NT kernel and base, along with nearly all the system libraries are closed source and thus only seen and fixed by Microsoft employees.

Besides the use of mature UNIX components and peer-reviewed open-source projects, another advantage Mac OSX has over its current windows counterpart for security and reliability is that it made a fresh break with it's predecesor, the legacy Mac OS 9. Instead of trying to shoehorn the OS 9 components into the new NextStep system to maintain compatibility with legacy software, they chose to use a virtual machine implementation to run older software. This solution made for a much smoother transistion and a more reliable and secure OS than the potential nightmare of combining the two code bases into a kludgy franken-OS. We all know Microsoft would be much better off if they had thrown out the strategy of eternal legacy support years ago. Thankfully, they seem to be doing so with Windows 7.

Thankfully, Apple's Mac OSX is also immune to the security ills of one of the most infamous and damaging components built into Windows that has left a nasty legacy of being one of the primary vectors for malware, spyware, trojans and other unathorized software to infect your system. In theory, "ActiveX controls" were simple, self-contained mini-applications -- much like Java Applets -- that could be embedded into web pages to enhance the functionality of the Microsoft's Internet explorer browser. Unfortunately, a few different issues conspired to turn them into a security nightmare. First of all, Internet explorer had been integrated more deeply into the operating system than previous versions had been, which gave it more access to the system. Secondly, in order to provide advanced functionality, ActiveX controls were given a much less restrictive execution environment and permissions than Java Applets. Lastly, Windows was setup where it was very common for individuals to run user accounts that had administrator priveleges. These factors allowed malicious software that exploited security holes in the browser and/or in the ActiveX/COM system to gain unprecedented access to the underlying operating system. It didn't take very long before malicious software writers made it dangerous to even visit an unknown website. Instead of just causing the web browser to crash or even the system to lockup, a security exploit could now actually install abritary software onto your system, which would then have an almost unlimited capacity to wreak havock. Soon there was a whole global economy of malicious software. Millions of people soon had malware and spyware on their systems that would do things such as constantly spawn pop-up product advertisments or track all their web browsing habits and send the data away to a foreign country to be sold. More malicious versions would log their keyboard activity and dig through their system looking to steal log-in information and passwords for bank accounts, stock trading accounts, email accounts, etc. Others would turn large numbers of PCs into a legion of "robots" under the control of one person or group which could then be used to launch cyberattacks on commercial websites or corporate servers.

As OSX's market penetration grows we are no doubt going to see a greater volume of attempts at native system exploits, and I'm not so naive as to believe OSX is somehow magically bulletproof from determined hackers... but I'm also not convinced that it will so readily fall to the onslaught of malware and adware like that we've seen with Windows. I don't say this from a fanboy perspective, as I don't even own a Mac. It's fairly easy to see what sets these operating systems apart, and where each have possible vulnerabilities.

I think we'll see greater security initiatives from both OS companies as they work on next-gen systems. The new architecture of Vista and especially Windows 7 should help Microsoft make up lost ground in the security fight after taking such a pounding with IE 4/5/5.5/6 security. In the Apple universe, I am glad to see that they are going to a general feature freeze on OSX "Leopard" (10.5), and spend their time making low-level performance, stability, and security improvements, including the creation of a new parallel processing-optimized threading / task model and a common spec for GPGPU programming. It's great to see them recognize that many consumers just want better performance, stability, and reliability with their existing system and applications than a hundred new features of questionable utility.

more info (yes, the writer of RD is a fanboy, but he's a clear writer with good information)
http://www.roughlydrafted.com/2008/04/01/the-unavoidable-malware-myth-why-apple-wont-inherit-microsofts-malware-crown/
http://www.roughlydrafted.com/2008/03/31/thom-holwerda-of-osnews-calls-“mac-shot-first”-misinformation-and-slander-oops/

well, disregard the compare apple or windows which one is more secure...I don't think that is the number 1 priority in I.T. department in fortune 500 companies. yes, there might be some iphone or ibook here and there but by no means their accounting fokes are using them. May be just the help desk.
In a large coporation, users don't just use browser.
they use enterprise software..yes, a lot of them runs on browser mode, but probably not certified for
Safari, but only IE. Other software probably are client server mode and even more are customized local softwares.
Do you know how large of a project is to certified all software to run on a MAC? Even for upgrade to vista it will be a big deal and a lot of people are not moving simply because they can't make everything work on vista....and you are now talking about a new mac o/s...that will be the day when I see SAP or Oracle certified for mac...there is not even a mac version...how mcuh do you think they have to do to re-write to a mac version..Some software is so large it's impossible for them to re-write in mac o/s which almost no market for it to paid for the cost of re-write.
the coporate software are like a elephant and it move a much slower speed than home machines.
you don't dump your accounting software because they wanted a mac or a ticket bar at the bottom because it's COOL.
There is a cost for it and right now that cost is simply too expensive.
I don't see mac will be main stream in office for another 10-20 years......
that's why mac is not even trying....they are more into the sony type of songs/movies/ipod/iphone area where they can go with new product fast and no need to worry about compatability.