x[cube] Labs has created an infographic that shows current developments and major trends in enterprise mobility including devices, platforms and application choices. The infographic is based on a number of surveys conducted by several companies, CIO Research Center, Symantec, ATT, Aruba, and others, over the last 12 months.
According to the report, 94% of the respondents said that enterprise mobility will play an important role in their IT strategy over the following year, and the expenditure on mobility solutions has steadily grown in the enterprise since 2007 when the first iPhone was introduced:
The main business benefits of introducing mobility in enterprises were: Increase Efficiency (73%), Employee Productivity (70%), Improve Customer Relation (69%), Increase Sales (69%), Improve Decision Making (68%), Employee Satisfaction (68%), Gain Competitive Advantage (66%), and Reduce Costs of Doing Business (66%).
54% of the enterprises allow employees to carry both personal and company-issued devices, while 23% allow only company-issued devices and the other 23% only personal devices. When it comes to support, 84% of the enterprises support only company-owned devices, while 11% support employees’ personal devices, and the other 5% allow the employees to decide.
Regarding the preferred mobile platform, there has been a major shift over the last 12 months, Blackberry seeing a major drop while iPhone and Android an increase:
While users love mobile devices, enterprises introduce such solutions for a different reason: mobile applications. According to another [x]cube Labs whitepaper, Enterprise Mobility Report - Unwiring the Enterprises, companies deploy mobile apps due to:
- Demand from workers.
- Business apps are maturing.
- App development costs have considerably decreased.
- Evolution in support and security.
If the Enterprise Mobility infographic is correct, then 70% of mobile applications developed during 2007-2011 will become obsolete or candidate for a remake by 2012, and 40% of Fortune 1000 organizations will adopt MEAP (Mobile Enterprise Application Platform) by 2014.
11% of the enterprises have already implemented a private application store, while 19% are working on it. 36% discuss the opportunity for such an app store and 34% have no plans for it.
When it comes to the technology used, 82% prefer HTML5 because it can be deployed on all devices, and 15% like it because of its support for animations, and only 5% said they would rather go with a pure native solution. Almost 75% of Fortune 500 companies are taking steps to create HTML5 apps, and 78% of mobile developers said they will integrate HTML5 into their applications in 2012.
Regarding the acquisition of mobile solutions, 36.8% of the enterprises prefer to built them in-house, 31.5% intend to outsource them, 30.7% plan to buy one, 20.1% are going to buy a MEAP with an SDK and configure the app in-house, 20.1% also want to buy a MEAP and SDK but outsource the development, while 6.1% have other unspecified options.
The Enterprise Mobility infographic contains more information related to mobile adoption by the enterprises not covered by this article.
