Enterprise mobility 2014 trends-to-watch

MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA: Enterprise mobility will continue to be one of the hottest topics in IT, and high on the list of priorities for all CIOs, according to Ovum's Enterprise Mobility 2014 Trends-to-Watch report.

Consumerization (i.e. the impact of technology designed first and foremost for consumers) has driven the enterprise mobility market over the last few years, and Ovum has identified the three major trends in mobile consumerization that will have the biggest impact on businesses in 2014.

Enterprise Mobility 2014 trends-to-watch:

- Businesses will need to provide a strong multi-screen, multi-channel experience for customers and employees, as mobile devices increasingly become the first point of contact between a business and its customers (B2C), suppliers (B2B), and employees.

Organisations will need to provide a slick user experience (UX) for every aspect of the business, from marketing, advertising, promotion, and sales through to internal processes, and whether the stakeholder is using a smartphone, tablet, or PC. Getting this right can be a complicated task and will require a strong focus on UX, both during the app development process and in terms of providing a corporate network with the capacity to deal with all the mobile devices demanding access to it.

- Businesses will address the drivers of BYOD with their new comprehensive corporate mobility policies. Businesses are already responding to BYOD with CYOD (choose your own device) or COPE (corporate-owned, personally enabled) strategies - in which employees are given a choice of devices to use by their employer and may also be permitted to use them personal purposes - and we expect to see more of this in 2014.

We also expect to see an increasing number of vertical or role-based mobility programs with strict corporate policies that specify mobile devices and applications (e.g. tablets provided to airline pilots).

- Apps will drive the next phase in the evolution of enterprise mobility, creating new ways of working, and transforming existing business processes. In 2014, enterprise mobile apps will become a core part of the enterprise IT application stack. This will create challenges for the enterprise such as getting the UX right and enabling tight integration with internal systems.

It also provides a big opportunity for app developers, systems integrators, and mobility management vendors. Enterprise mobility is moving away from a pure mobility or device problem to an IT corporate management problem, with secure access, content, application, and BI implications.

- Enterprise mobility programs will extend beyond being pure connectivity and device issues for IT and business decision-makers. For organizations that already have a mobility strategy in place, the next phase will be to start mobilizing as many internal processes as possible to allow workers to perform their core tasks (beyond email) from whichever device they have to hand, from wherever they are.

Richard Absalom, senior analyst of Enterprise Mobility, at Ovum, says: "As businesses adapt to increasing consumerization and extend the range of tools and applications available to employees on all devices, enterprises and supply-side vendors alike need to be prepared for these developing trends: businesses in order to realize the full business benefits of mobile working, and vendors in order to address enterprise demand and remain relevant in a crowded, highly competitive market."