Author Archive
Monday, March 5th, 2012
Kevin Murray, VP, Product Marketing
Many of us have experienced it. The great network slowdown when we are in high density locations, like city centers or events. Our smartphones show maximum 3G bars, but we can’t even update our status on Facebook. Some big data consumers (aka data “hogs”) may have even been throttled (connectivity purposely slowed as we surpass the 1.5 GB mark). Being unable to connect is frustrating, annoying and anxiety laden.
The strain of limited and congested cellular bandwidth is already impacting the mobile workforce. In our latest iPass Mobile Workforce Report, we found that over the last year, there has been a 25 percent decline in satisfaction among mobile employees with their mobile network service. This is primarily attributed to data coverage (only half of respondents were satisfied) and network speed (only a third of respondents were satisfied).
Some experts are predicting this is only going to get worse with wireless traffic growing exponentially — in triple digits (111 percent), and smartphones consuming 24 times more data than old-school cell phones and tablets consuming five times more data than smartphones. And this isn’t just limited to the telecommunications industry either; Gartner recently predicted that by 2015, 80 percent of newly installed enterprise wireless networks will be obsolete due to the initial installation of non-scalable technology.
We are experiencing the first effects of ‘Mobile Darwinism.” As we define it, the evolution of technology and data consumption outpacing the ability of networks and business infrastructures to adapt.
But ‘Mobile Darwinism’ is not about the victims it is about the survivors. It is how we will adapt to the change and the technologies that we will implement to ensure that we can be globally mobile that matter. As Charles Darwin said, “it is not the strongest species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the ones most responsive to change.”
At iPass we’re a fairly optimistic bunch. One positive sign that enterprises and telecom service providers will adapt and rise to the bandwidth challenge is the resurgence we’re seeing in Wi-Fi. This quarter’s report showed that 61 percent of a mobile worker’s day is within range of a Wi-Fi network, and 83 percent of respondents are within range of Wi-Fi for 16 hours a day.
Mobile workers are also actively using Wi-Fi (offloading the traffic themselves from strained cellular networks) – 58 percent of respondents reported they actively use Wi-Fi more than two hours a day on their smartphones, 73 percent on their tablets, and 83 percent on their laptops.
Download the report >>
Read the press release >>
Mobile Darwinism: Adapt or be Throttled >>
Wednesday, September 28th, 2011
Kevin Murray, VP, Product Marketing
Nearly a year ago we predicted that companies will adopt a “bring your own mobile device” policy. Yet you didn’t need a crystal ball to see that the popularity of iPhones and Androids would drive this change in the workplace, expanding the mobile workforce and dethroning the BlackBerry.
Today we released our annual survey of IT executives, the Mobile Enterprise Report, which reveals exactly what devices enterprises are now supporting, how policies have changed and what the overall impact has been on IT.
The cascade of new devices, provisioned, supported or allowed is creating challenges for IT. IT executives report that their top five mobility issues are:
- Providing support for specialized members’ (e.g. an executive) non-provisioned devices
- Onboarding and ongoing support for personal mobile devices
- Data encryption, data loss, data back-up, and recovery
- Ensuring network security (e.g., anti-virus, firewall, VPN, etc.)
- Onboarding and ongoing support for corporate mobile devices (10 percent
It is no wonder that providing support for a “specialized member” [Read: executive and his/her new gadget] was number one, considering that 61 percent of IT departments have made an exception for a specialized member and 57 percent have done this more than once.
The report also reveals that 73 percent of enterprises allow non-IT managed devices to access corporate resources – what we also call a Bring-Your-Own-Device – BYOD – policy. Not only are non-IT managed devices growing, enterprises are also expanding support for iPhones and Androids – 67 percent of enterprises plan to increase their provisioning of iPhones (up from 52 percent who currently do), 64 percent will provision Android smartphones (up from 48 percent).
And new on the scene, tablets are also quickly gaining momentum – either as a replacement for a laptop or as an additional mobile device. Within the next 12 months, 66 percent of enterprises will provision iPads (up from 46 percent), and 44 percent will provision Android tablets (up from just 19 percent today).
IT executives report that technical support volumes and complexity have increased – 48 percent of IT departments stated that employees contacted IT more with technical support issues than they did two years ago. 45 percent of IT departments stated that the IT problems were more complex than two years ago.
Security problems are also on the rise, especially with non-IT managed devices – 46 percent of IT executives admitted to experiencing a security problem related to an employee with an unprovisioned device.
And connectivity remains expensive, and will only rise – 68 percent of IT managers believe their mobility costs will go up over the next 12 months, and 24 percent believe expenditures will rise by over 10 percent. The bulk of the increase is attributed to rise in the number of mobile users and employees’ expanding use of multiple devices.
How does your company compare? Get our report and find out.
Bring Your Own Device: Easy to Do, Hard to Manage >>
Tuesday, July 5th, 2011
Kevin Murray, VP, Product Marketing
Around the globe, mobile service providers are embracing Wi-Fi as an increasingly important and integrated component of their mobile network fabric, and making big announcements about building out Wi-Fi networks to seamlessly integrate them with their 3G and 4G networks. Now there’s iPass OMX.
The next wave of Wi-Fi is becoming a carrier-led phenomenon and the iPass Open Mobile Exchange enables them to capitalize on this tremendous opportunity with speed to market and a reduced cost and risk profile. With iPass Open Mobile Exchange, they can now deliver mobile IP data offload and Wi-Fi roaming services across millions of Wi-Fi hotspots around the globe in a seamless and frictionless manner.
Historically, service providers viewed Wi-Fi as an extension of their fixed broadband Internet business, not as a viable extension of their mobility business. However, with demand for mobile broadband resources so high and growing at a compound annual rate of 92%, operators who can artfully negotiate the best licensed and unlicensed spectrum strategy will deliver the greatest mobile experience at the highest profit margin attainable.
By integrating the best of both worlds, licensed and unlicensed spectrum, the iPass Open Mobile Exchange helps service providers to capitalize on the rapid growth of Wi-Fi devices. iPass has uniquely combined a ‘zero 3G-touch’ mobile data offload solution with a ‘zero-click’ Wi-Fi data roaming service, making Wi-Fi access as easy to use as cellular and functioning like data roaming, automatically connecting users to preferred networks to create an ‘always best connected’ user experience.
With iPass OMX, service providers can:
- Reduce network and signaling congestion by offloading mobile IP data traffic to operator-preferred Wi-Fi networks, including free Wi-Fi.
- Expand your portfolio to include Wi-Fi-only handsets and grow the number of devices connected to your network, increasing addressable market size and revenue potential.
- Simplify the end-user connectivity experience with zero-click, seamless device or user-based authentication.
- Add new serving areas through Wi-Fi to broaden your geographic reach.
- Increase customer loyalty by making data roaming more cost-effective and deepening vital relationships with end-users on a global scale.
- Monetize your Wi-Fi network assets to other service providers.
The end result is a highly differentiated consumer offering that delivers a more satisfying user connectivity experience while maximizing your network infrastructure investment.
Our iPass Open Mobile Exchange web page will give you more details and videos about the solution. You can also read our press release.
The strategic importance of Wi-Fi to mobile service providers – iPass OMX >>
Monday, October 25th, 2010
Kevin Murray, VP, Product Marketing
On a recent visit to Europe, I had the pleasure of talking directly to iPass customers on a Customer Advisory tour. I visited customers in London, Frankfurt and Paris – all-in-all chatting with about 10 different large enterprise customers.
There were some consistent themes:
- Free Wi-Fi is not as big in Europe as it is in North America (and Asia, they reported)
- Windows 7 is taking awhile to get out, with most organizations using 2011 to evaluate; as a result, XP SP3 is still the OS of choice in these organizations
- Macs are not penetrating the large enterprise as quickly as we might think
- Smartphones are interesting, and most are supporting iPhones and kicking the tires on Android
Free Wi-Fi
Free Wi-Fi is increasing in the US as quickly as you can say “Starbucks” but it simply is not moving as fast in Europe. Customers attribute this to fragmented provider strategies and many looking to cling to these day-pass dollars. Although slow to adopt, most agreed that it would happen eventually, just not fast enough.
Windows 7
It doesn’t matter how hard Microsoft tries, customers are going to move to a new operating system when they darn well please. One customer is moving to Windows 7 soon, though mostly because they reported Microsoft was making it difficult to renew licenses on Windows XP, providing that added push over the cliff for them. (Ouch!)
Others merely stated they just were not convinced they could do it without significant pain. So, to minimize that pain, they want to test as much as possible, determine their standard image and then roll out. I’m sure this is not what they want to hear in Redmond, but this sentiment was fairly consistent throughout. XP SP3 remains the top dog, and Microsoft has made it clear that they won’t be adding any enhancements to XP, which had ruffled some feathers with one customer in a big way.
Macs – Where Are They?
With the meteoric rise of Apple’s “i-devices,” the Mac has benefited greatly, drafting off the big rig as effectively as a road bike. But we asked our Council customers and they reported very small pockets – not enough to outright manage them, so they just “tolerate” them. So where are they all going?
I would love to hear your thoughts on this.
Smartphones – Are iPhone and Android Taking Over Yet?
The short answer is “no” — at least, not in the enterprise yet. While corporate policy varied on whether they support these devices, or even pay for them, it is clear that only the minority had committed to managing them.
There was still a high incidence of Blackberry as the standard, and the sense was that it would be awhile before iPhone or Android displaced the Blackberry as the standard. Why? Well, because the BES Server (“Blackberry Enterprise Server”) is considered more secure since it is a relatively isolated/protected environment.
It was understood, however, that Android has an advantage (in the enterprise) for a couple of reasons: 1) It has true multi-tasking and can run apps in the background, making it easier for Android devices to be managed like other enterprise devices, and 2) Google seems more willing to build features specifically to meet the needs of the enterprise, unlike Apple. Tough news for Apple – but the way they’re going, they may not need the enterprise.
So that was the tour – we learned a lot, and are planning a round with North America in the coming months. Stay tuned for updates, and please feel free to comment on this post.
Enterprise Mobility in my European Customer Tour >>
Wednesday, September 29th, 2010
Kevin Murray, VP, Product Marketing
Android is in the workplace. There has been recent news of organizations testing iPhones, iPads and Androids in the corporate environment, with many IT departments realizing that either employees are buying these preferred devices and feel more productive on them, or for some situations, there may be upside in having more open platforms with easy-to-use inputs and interfaces. In general, Android provides a more open platform, giving IT departments the ability to integrate their own apps more easily.
Enterprises want control
Security of data and networks is top priority. With the iPass Open Mobile Platform and the Android client, organizations can control which networks are offered, whether iPass-defined or their own. Directory updates are pushed out automatically. The iPass client runs in the background, and depending on the prioritization of networks for the device profile, can notify a user when an iPass Wi-Fi hotspot is available.
Connectivity can be managed and controlled for those networks. iPass Mobile Insight can provide reports showing the number of sessions, usage statistics and service quality information for improved help desk response. With the iPass OpenAccess, users can connect seamlessly to free hotspots, that have been vetted and approved, ensuring a quality connection.
Enterprises want to support what’s easy
iPass provides a way to provision, deploy and manage the Android phone, like the laptops. An Android client profile, controlled through the iPass Open Mobile Portal, contains information on what networks the user will be able to connect to as well as information on how users should connect. An organization can ensure that its unique policies and procedures are followed before accessing Wi-Fi networks and be more proactive in moving users to lower-cost networks.
iPass Open Mobile for Android users will have access to over 150,000 Wi-Fi locations across the globe, as well as in-flight access. All access is consolidated into a single relationship, meaning that organizations don’t have to manage multiple carrier relationships or deal with individual users charging back service expenses whenever they travel.
Enterprises want cost reduction
As mentioned earlier last week, controlled access to Wi-Fi can help prevent unintentional roaming costs or data downloads from the more expensive 3G networks. Not only can Wi-Fi have higher connectivity, but it’s also more available in places for business travel – airports, hotels, convention centers, areas that often have weaker 3G signals. Moving users to Wi-Fi networks can provide a cost savings advantage as more carriers move away from unlimited data access.
Enterprises want end-user productivity
Android, like the iPhone and iPad, has become a “people’s choice.” New devices, OS updates and apps are coming out constantly. Users have voted with their time and usage, connecting more often and downloading more data (link to Android data stats). As smartphone shipments overtake PCs, mobile devices move to become the dominant computing platform for mobile workers.
Mobile workers want to use a device that helps them be more productive; not necessarily the device that IT is offering and they are willing to pay for it. With the iPass client, users can connect more quickly and easily, resulting in a better, more consistent experience.
There may be many instances where the connection quality and throughput offered by 3G does not match the needs for the applications that enterprise organizations want to leverage on a smartphone (e.g. VoIP). Leveraging Wi-Fi as an alternative may be an easy way to get the throughput and latency required for high bandwidth applications. Wi-Fi can also improve productivity when users are downloading email, trying to get caught up as quickly as possible.
The Android smartphone is predicted to be a dominant player in the smartphone market and has started to make inroads as a mobile workforce device. iPass now offers an expansion of the iPass Open Mobile Platform to manage Android as an enterprise-ready device.
Find out more from our whitepaper, “Android – Open for Business” >>
See how easy it is to connect with your Android in our video >>
Or, just go to the iPass Open Mobile for Android page for more info
Android open for business >>
