Choosing an enterprise-class mobile platform is becoming
increasingly difficult as the line between consumer devices and
business devices blurs.
IT departments are coming under pressure from end-users
demanding to use their feature-rich personal smartphones to access
corporate systems, instead of the company supported device. They
have the added complexity of supporting several alternative mobile
operating systems.
Managing mobile users is a key requirement for IT departments.
They provide remote access for laptop PC users using devices like
RSA tokens and encryption to prevent unauthorised access to
corporate systems. However, IT departments have been
reluctant to support mobile phones, which are increasingly
offering the basic connectivity and collaboration that used to
require a laptop PC.
The one device that has been accepted wholeheartedly by IT
departments is Research in Motion's Blackberry. Rim would argue
that the Blackberry has been designed for corporate IT and is easy
to manage remotely.
Forrester Research says the Blackberry Enterprise Server (BES)
is the gold standard for mobile device control. The latest
BES 5.0 software, which was released last week, offers
improvements in manageability, high availability and through an
add-on called Blackberry MVS Server, office calls can be routed to
the device automatically. But Blackberry is not the latest "must
have" handheld.
It seems the public cannot get enough of Apple's iPhone. "The
iPhone's intuitive interface, superior browsing experience, and
rapidly evolving
developer toolkit make content-centric applications far more
appealing on an iPhone than on a Blackberry," says Ted Schadler,
vice-president at Forrester Research. "End-users vote for freedom
by purchasing iPhones over company-supplied devices."
Business people have been buying the iPhone for personal use,
but IT has been reluctant to support it in the business.
Compared to the Blackberry, management and guaranteed message
delivery tools for the iPhone are still weak - a deal-breaker for
some, especially for those in regulated industries, says
Schadler.
Access to Microsoft's propriety e-mail server, Microsoft
Exchange, is another problem area for iPhone users. Until Apple and
Microsoft figure out how to make Exchange calendar synchronisation
work for both Exchange 2003 and Exchange 2007, Forrester Research
recommends IT directors introduce a "buyer beware" policy if
employees want to use their iPhone to schedule or change
meetings.
There is a third contender. With hundreds of millions of phones
in circulation it is hard to ignore the impact of Nokia. The
6-Series Nokia handset is a de facto standard for corporate mobile
handsets. But apart from procurement and selecting a mobile price
plan, IT departments have treated Nokia handsets as mobile phones,
rather than fully-functional mobile computing devices.
This may be set to change. Applications have existed for the
Symbian operating system used on Nokia handsets for some time, but
experts argue that they have been difficult to find. The mobile
phone maker has now introduced OVI, an online shop similar to the
Apple AppStore, which may boost downloads of Nokia phone
applications.
There are yet more options for IT departments to consider. Along
with Blackberry, iPhone and Nokia, Google's Android is making rapid
in-roads into the mobile platform market.
Microsoft's Windows Mobile platform is also gaining momentum,
with specialist software houses and system integrators building
mobile enterprise applications based on Microsoft-powered mobile
hardware.
With so much choice, Forrester Research urges IT directors to
consider giving employees the freedom to choose the mobile tools
they want. Schadler says, "If an iPhone makes an employee happy,
then supporting it will deliver collateral benefits of a happier
workforce and a new line of communication between IT and
employees."
And, if end-users are happy to buy and maintain their own
smartphones, IT directors may find they have one less thing to
worry about.