Enterprise Mobility battle moves to tablets

Monday, December 5th, 2011 Karen Ambrose Hickey, Editor

No more on the smartphone wars. That horse has left the barn. It’s the “Tablet Wars” baby.

Apple Begins to Dominate on BlackBerry’s Enterprise Turf – Is it Game Over for RIM? by Tony Rizzo, Editor in Chief at Mobile Enterprise states that RIM is not alone in this battle. “Even the collection of Android tablets from myriad vendors taken as a whole do not compete.” And then, “Mobile Enterprise believes that the tablet battle will be fought, long term, between Win 8 tablets and the iPad.”

But wait. In last week’s article, Is Microsoft Running Out of Time for Tablets?, Nick Wingfield of the NYTimes says that Microsoft clearly has some catching up to do and, according to an upcoming Forrester report, has little time to do it.

Even if enterprises choose to bring Windows 8 into their organization, employees have shown a clear preference in iPads (see our Mobile Workforce Report), and will bring in their own devices. Even RIM is working with the “Bring Your Own Device” policy, leveraging the BlackBerry network to support iPhones and Androids as well.

Ian Paul of PCWorld, has been covering this emerging war zone for awhile, assessing new challengers all the time, most recently the Kindle Fire and Nook Tablet in Tablet Wars Update: If You Can’t Beat ‘Em, Out Consume ‘Em. “ Ian notes, “[Nook Tablet and Kindle Fire are] trying to win over customers by offering a cheaply priced tablet that can match the iPad in terms of content consumption.” And that’s fine, however, the iPad has moved beyond content comsumption only, into content-creation. Staying a step ahead.

Tags: Microsoft, RIM, tablet