Mobile Strategy

The Year of the Mobile Enterprise – 2012

Jose HC — Sat, 31 Dec 2011 16:52:58 +0000

I have always been excited by massive change. As a high school and undergraduate student I loved to read about historical turning points, revolutions, political upheavals … where things were turned upside down and the system/structure/government that was left in its place was completely different from what had been there before.

It would appear that we can no longer hope for such monumental changes in the mobile space. No longer is mobility something we hope for. No longer is it something we dream about. It is so much a part of our every day lives that we are even taking it for granted.

But is it really that much a part of our lives? I would argue that true mobility (read mobile enablement) has not yet penetrated the enterprise. In many ways mobility has been kept outside of the enterprise fortress. It is the last bastion to be conquered in 2012. The extension of email and calendaring is not true mobile enablement.

In 2012 we will see the enterprise mobility space reshaped. Long dominated by the BlackBerry Enterprise Solution by the end of 2012 the mobile enterprise will look very different than what it does today. Do not think that this monumental change will start on January 1st … it started a few years ago. Palm, Good Technology and Research In Motion all paved the way for what will happen in 2012. As old devices come up for a refresh and the pent-up demand for functionality increases IT departments everywhere will be forced to seriously consider opening the doors to true mobility.

Enterprise mobility is about extending the enterprise to mobile employees where ever they are on a wide variety of devices. This can be done securely and efficiently through the many mobile device management solutions out there (i.e Afaria and the future BES/Ubitexx combo among others). If the enterprise stops only at the device management aspect of it they will completely miss the boat and it can not in good conscience be called ‘enterprise mobility.’ On top of managing the devices you will need to provide access to critical enterprise applications as well as some consumer apps available through the app stores (or all – depending on your security concerns). Speaking of app stores you will also need to decide how will control and to whom you will distribute each mobile app – you can also do this with an internal enterprise mobile application store.

In 2012 the enterprise will truly become mobile. The key term mobile strategy (or mobility strategy) will begin to be identified more and more with your enterprise mobile strategy (roadmap) as much as it has been over the last few years with your approach to your market through the mobile channel.

Similar Posts:

Thinking About RIM, its people and its future

SAP European Football Experience: Not Just Stats but Insights

Jose HC — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 00:33:29 +0000

]]>

Mobile Strategy vs Mobility Strategy

Jose HC — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 02:12:14 +0000

I have been thinking about this difference the last few days. Some people use the terms interchangeably as if they mean the same thing. They don’t mean the same thing… I am still cementing my thoughts on these differences but I think it is a good exercise for all of us if we are able to go deeper into the meaning of each.

What do think? Is there a difference? Are they referring to the same thing? Or different things?

Thinking About RIM, its people and its future

Jose HC — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 14:59:26 +0000

First of all let me tell you something that has been heavily on my mind over the last week or so – RIM is NOT Nortel. I will write more about that later on, but I believe that Research In Motion and its BlackBerry line of products and services has a long life left in them. This is not an obituary. We are just taking a break from mobility to think about our friends and the lives being affected one way or another by the ‘reset’ that RIM is going through right now.

It has been 4 days since Research In Motion announced a large scale reorganization, the retirement of Don Morrison and 2,000 layoffs. The news, however, did not hit home until late Tuesday afternoon when I first got wind of the names of some of those being let go. The folks released are far more senior than I originally anticipated. It definitely hit home because I worked very closely with ‘some’ of those people in my past. If you check LinkedIn you can already see profile changes and people who were previously inactive are much more active now.

Prior to my current role, and before and after my time at RIM, I worked in large-scale reorganizations, layoffs and process re-engineering. One thing I can tell you is that the tension will always be present in this type of situation.

It is inevitable; it is unavoidable. It is part of the process.

I have seen and personally tried all kinds of ‘change management’ techniques and at the end of the day there are always casualties far beyond the actual people that are let go. What RIM is going through right now is painful; very painful. And it is ugly. Very ugly – especially on a personal and human level.

But it was necessary. The market changed. Competition became real. If you are a current employee this may even be impossible for you to understand – but if this is executed correctly RIM will be a stronger company by the end of this current quarter. Believe me when I say that no one at the top took this decision lightly. In fact, I would go out on limb and tell you that even Jim Balsilie and Mike Laziridis lost sleep over this. I have coached executives through this kind of thing before and the ones that suffer the most are those that built the company with their own hands (i.e. founders, entrepreneurs). In my opinion, both Mike and Jim will try their hardest for this not to happen again. It does not feel good and it penetrates to the deepest parts of a founder’s ego. In some ways they may even perceive this as their own personal failure.

Regardless of your opinion of them – Mike and Jim have worked very hard over the years and have sacrificed much on the personal side as well. How much they sacrificed only those closest to them really know. Bottom line – this is not easy for anyone. It goes to the core of an organization’s heart… and everybody hurts. Everybody.

Unfortunately as humans we sometimes need big shakeups to bring about true change. We need to be shocked out of complacency and comfort zones in order for us to bring up our game.

So far the execution of the ‘changes’ has hit among other areas sales, marketing and product management. Of course, as an outsider I do not have complete visibility into what is going on and I am sure there are other areas being affected. My hope is that these folks are not merely scapegoats but that RIM will truly use this time to refocus and leverage the enormous talent and capacity that is still in house.

I left RIM three years ago and I have only good memories from my time there. Although today my main device at work is the BlackBerry Torch I do have an iPhone and a Samsung Galaxy S at home and my work Playbook is on order (I actually just returned my iPad so I could have a Playbook instead). Despite all of its shortcoming I still consider my Blackberry an invaluable productivity tool for work. But here’s the catch – I only use 3 applications outside of email, contacts and calendaring (LinkedIn, Twitter and Globe and Mail Politics). For anything else I use my wife’s iPhone or my Android device.

So I close this post and this week with RIM in my mind and on my heart. I want to firmly position myself in the corner of those that believe that RIM is NOT dead. If all goes well Research In Motion will be a stronger company by next quarter and will release new products and services that will enable them get back on track.

Do you want to know what RIM’s secret weapon is? Even today the BlackBerry platform differentiates itself from all others through its BlackBerry Enterprise Server and the thousands of implementations. If there is one player that can instantly dominate the Mobile Device Management space in one swoop is RIM. With their acquisition of Ubitexx they should be able to get there relatively soon. Will write a separate post on this early next week.

Of course all the hopes reflected in this post are also predicated on my belief that RIM will refresh its devices with QNX to the point of making them more competitive and that their product design and release cycles will be compressed and enable them to come to market faster.Similar Posts:

Contactless Payments and Barclaycard

Jose HC — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 11:55:51 +0000

Posted via email from Mobile Strategy

Freedom In Mobility

Jose HC — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 00:22:25 +0000

The criticism (more like the complaint) we hear a lot these days has to do with our ‘over-connectedness.’

We are told that people are too connected… That it is interfering with personal lives and affecting our quality of life.

Really?

Is it technology’s fault or is it our inability to say no to technology that is affecting us?

It is like you or I walking into an all-you-can-eat buffet. We have the freedom to eat all we want. But do we? Or do we draw the line somewhere? (I know many don’t).

Connectivity and being connected everywhere (that’s what we call mobility – or better yet freedom) is not ruining our society.

Is it that we are allowing our priorities to get out of whack? Or did that mobile device force you to…?

Mobile technology offers us the freedom to be connected and to choose when to be connected – through that fabulous little feature…the off button.

Isn’t it just like everything else in life?

Are Mobile Apps Disposable?

Jose HC — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 11:54:19 +0000

Another way of posing this question is ‘should mobile apps be considered disposable?’

The answer is no. If your mobile strategy is such that you are considering putting something (ie. an app) together as a quick fix to coming into the game late … then you really don’t have a mobile strategy.

Please don’t build something thinking that the devices will change in 18 months or less and that it really doesn’t matter how well thought out your plan is since you will dispose of the most recent mobile app and just build a new one. These days you can’t throw a stone down the street without hitting a mobile developer or two…so it should be easy enough to just build something to get us out of the bind… Right?

Wrong!
Since enterprise mobility is not about the apps but about extending the enterprise wherever it needs to be, a strategy that revolves around a disposable mobile apps is not a strategy at all. At the end of the day the app and the device are mostly consumption vehicles (some creation too of course). The magic needs to happen back at the enterprise. This is why you need a platform and not merely a mobile application.

How Smart is your Smartphone?

Jose HC — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 21:30:02 +0000

A few months ago my friends at Soluteo asked me to work with them on a short presentation on “How Smart is your Smartphone?” It was one of those fun projects and the output which was presented about a month ago is up on Slideshare and embedded below.

Although part of the presentation is a bit tongue-in cheek we are strong believers in the final answer. Your Smartphone is only as smart as …

The end user?
The apps?
The application developers?
The device manufacturers?
The network?

Or is there something else? Let’s narrow it to an enterprise environment. What makes a smartphone smart for an enterprise? Feel free to comment after the slides.

How Smart is your Smartphone (March 2011)

View more presentations from Jose Colucci

Similar Posts:

Growth of Android Video

Jose HC — Sat, 05 Mar 2011 18:22:35 +0000

Just a neat perspective on it. Enjoy.

Found it at MobileSyrup
Originally from pestaola.grSimilar Posts:

Thinking About RIM, its people and its future

Mobile Operators Respond to Global Trends

Jose HC — Sat, 26 Feb 2011 07:05:19 +0000

Déjà vu with data growth

We have been here before. Data traffic already exceeds voice on many mobile networks. And it is predicted to increase 1000-fold within a decade as wireless becomes the world’s primary method of Internet access. A massive surge in fixed network traffic started approximately 15 years ago. Data surpassed and then dwarfed voice as Internet access and IP services drove exponential growth.

Major fiber investments around the millennium provided copious amounts of cheap bandwidth for consumers. Unfortunately, overinvestment followed by bankruptcies and significant retrenchment proved to be a painful experience for many network service providers, their vendor-financed suppliers and other investors. The question is: Will these mistakes be repeated in the bonanza to turn 3 billion mobile voice and text users into mobile broadband consumers on Long Term Evolution (LTE) and 4G networks?

Mobile broadband economics

To help ensure profitable growth, mobile operators are revamping their business models. This will include charging on the basis of speeds, data volumes, service levels and advanced services which can be combined with the raw connectivity.

In the fixed telecoms boom of the 1990s, aggressive pricing on highly commoditized connectivity services and vendor financing exposed many operators and their suppliers to significant losses. Today, operators and technology vendors must be careful to ensure services are more differentiated and expenditures are better matched to their revenues.

Some players triumphed through the fixed Internet access revolution. These included incumbent local phone companies, leading DSL equipment suppliers, and many web companies including Amazon.com and Google. But there were also significant financial casualties such as some national backbone and international communications service providers, fiber optic transmission equipment manufacturers and many ISPs. The challenge will be to figure out which strategies will be required to capitalize upon the mobile broadband revolution while avoiding previous mistakes.

Old and new challenges

The old 3G problem was that nobody used it much. At first, flat-rate unlimited data pricing made great sense in developed nations where a sizable segment of price-insensitive users were encouraged to use it while providing them comfort that the monthly expenditure was fixed. The arrangement was also simple for operators with no need for metering or complex billing and no shortage of network capacity. That all changed a few years ago when users – of smartphones as well as data cards and dongles – started using 3G networks a lot.

The relatively new 3G problem and the upcoming 4G challenge is that escalating demand must be economically balanced with supply. This is a multi-faceted puzzle that must use pricing to temper demand and associated network costs. It’s closing time for the one-size-fits-all, all-you-can-eat pricing model because it:

Fails to extract higher expenditures from those who are willing to pay more

Excludes price-sensitive users who would be willing to pay lower prices for limited usage or reduced performance

Subjects operators to extremely high usage and at great cost from a small proportion of customers

Figure 1 illustrates how a single flat rate limits revenues by restricting pricing opportunities with those people who are willing to pay more and restricts subscriber uptake with those who are only willing to pay less.

Figure 1: Flat-rate pricing limits revenues and restricts subscriber uptake

The desire to boost revenues while limiting total costs has made flat-rate pricing with unlimited usage unworkable in mobile except on new networks with excess capacity where the lure of this pricing model can accelerate subscriber acquisition. Unfortunately, speeds on parts of these networks soon plummet due to congestion. Operators carry a heavy burden increasing mobile broadband capacity because costs with spectrum, radio access, backhaul, and core network technologies are significantly higher per gigabyte transported than on fixed networks with fiber and copper access lines.

Furthermore, the vast majority of mobile subscribers worldwide have prepaid, pay-as-you-go pricing for voice and text. With so many of these users in cash-based economies and without operator billing relationships or credit ratings, they will also be best suited and most amenable to prepaid and usage-based arrangements for data.

New mobile business models from many operators worldwide include tiered service pricing on the basis of access speeds, volumes of data and session lengths with prepaid and postpaid charging. Operators are also seeking to enrich services with improved quality of service (QoS), quality of experience (QoE), location-based capabilities and more.

Footing the bill

Bringing broadband IP and Internet access to the world’s masses is a very costly undertaking no matter which technology is used. Wireless broadband upgrades from 2G to 3G or 4G are highly suited to places where there are no landlines including some remote regions in developed nations.

Europe’s millennial 3G licensing also caused an economic shock to the telecoms sector that should not be repeated. Taxing mobile operators with high spectrum costs in conventional auctions extracts excessive capital from the sector and impairs investment for the most expensive to reach places and those consumers who have the least to spend.

The legacy of the over investment and excessively competitive pricing in long-haul, fiber-based communications capacity a decade ago is that some assets were able to be purchased after the bust for a small percentage of original costs. In conjunction with copper landlines funded by preceding decades of monopoly profits, this has provided affordable broadband Internet access to those who happen to live in the right places, but what about everybody else?

Mobile broadband infrastructure is very costly, though not as expensive as pulling fiber to rural and remote communities everywhere. The danger is that mobile network expansion will be curtailed if spectrum is taxed too highly in auction fees. Licensing with more significant coverage and service level obligations in conjunction with less costly spectrum would extend coverage and capacity investment much further.

Bridging the digital divide

Existing fixed broadband Internet users who have mobile lifestyles are the most obvious early adopters for mobile broadband on phones, laptop PCs and other devices. However, their demands could ultimately be exceeded by the billions who today have limited or no Internet access and to whom fixed Internet access with fiber or copper connections are not economical. Mobile broadband is always on and always with you – a weekly commute to an Internet café or a library visit is a far cry from the pervasive Internet experience provided with personal mobile devices. For these people, mobile broadband will become the predominant or only means of Internet access.

Compared to wireline, wireless remains the most economical option for voice and Internet access outside of densely populated areas and for approximately half of the world’s population. Over the last 15 years the Internet was brought to many who already had landline phones, by first using dial-up and then through DSL over existing copper access lines connected to newly built fiber-optic backbones. Meanwhile, remote regions and developing nations were catching up on voice services with 2G cellular-based access.

Cellular devices are now also more accessible and most suitable for the mobile lifestyles and literacy levels of many who spend most of their time outside of a home or office. Looking ahead, LTE will bridge the digital divide. Wireless networks will migrate to 3G and 4G including next-generation IP technologies and will bring mobile broadband Internet to billions of people who have cellphones but no fixed access.

via www2.alcatel-lucent.com

Posted via email from Mobile Strategy