I don't see Mac ever having more than a small segment of the Enterprise market. Microsoft is simply too entrenched and corporate bean counters are to wedded to the Wintel duopoly.
How do you define small?
I'm thinking the Mac could eventually reach between 10% and 20% of the enterprise market in the US. Some might call that small, but it would be huge to both Apple and Microsoft, because Apple would be taking that share off the top.
I really don't think bean counting is that big of an obstacle to the Mac achieving a 10 to 20% share in the enterprise. The top 10 to 20% of employees in a firm ("top" in terms of rank in the hierarchy, salary, productivity, etc) can easily win a battle over cost.
The real obstacles are technical, but Apple has been slowly addressing those over the years. Three big things that have changed in the last ten years are: (1) Macs have greatly improved built-in support for Microsoft technologies like Exchange and SMB, (2) Macs have much better security features today (FileVault is very important in some contexts), and (3) IE6 has been supplanted by WebKit as the industry standard. That third one might be the biggest win of all for the Mac (even though the battle was fought by the iPhone).
There are probably some more technical issues that need to be addressed that I'm unaware of, but I think we're getting to the point where there really aren't major technical obstacles to having Macs in the enterprise. Once we get to that point, the biggest obstacle will just be communication --- helping IT understand that those technical obstacles are gone and that Macs really can coexist with PCs in an enterprise setting. The partnership with IBM and Apple's other enterprise efforts will open those lines of communication. Stated differently, there is the potential here for a substantial "halo effect" from the iPad and iPhone that will benefit the Mac.
I'm actually pretty optimistic about this -- I think we are finally, finally getting close to Macs being accepted in the enterprise in large numbers.
I don't see Mac ever having more than a small segment of the Enterprise market. Microsoft is simply too entrenched and corporate bean counters are to wedded to the Wintel duopoly.
Believe it or not, people said the same about IBM -- in fact, even more vehemently -- 30 years ago.
I don't see Mac ever having more than a small segment of the Enterprise market. Microsoft is simply too entrenched and corporate bean counters are to wedded to the Wintel duopoly.
How do you define small?
I'm thinking the Mac could eventually reach between 10% and 20% of the enterprise market in the US. Some might call that small, but it would be huge to both Apple and Microsoft, because Apple would be taking that share off the top.
I really don't think bean counting is that big of an obstacle to the Mac achieving a 10 to 20% share in the enterprise. The top 10 to 20% of employees in a firm ("top" in terms of rank in the hierarchy, salary, productivity, etc) can easily win a battle over cost.
IF that happened (10% to 20% of management) then you are right and that would happen. The tipping point for widespread adoption is between 17% to 19% according to history. Top tier management (especially sales and marketing) has already demanded that IT "find a way" to accommodate MacBook Air into the infra-structure.
The real obstacles are technical, but Apple has been slowly addressing those over the years. Three big things that have changed in the last ten years are: (1) Macs have greatly improved built-in support for Microsoft technologies like Exchange and SMB, (2) Macs have much better security features today (FileVault is very important in some contexts), and (3) IE6 has been supplanted by WebKit as the industry standard. That third one might be the biggest win of all for the Mac (even though the battle was fought by the iPhone).
Microsoft has made it difficult for other desk OS to work well in a Wintel-rich enviornment by building in stumbling blokcs... for some reason that self-serving wall isn't working as well as it once did.
There are probably some more technical issues that need to be addressed that I'm unaware of, but I think we're getting to the point where there really aren't major technical obstacles to having Macs in the enterprise. Once we get to that point, the biggest obstacle will just be communication --- helping IT understand that those technical obstacles are gone and that Macs really can coexist with PCs in an enterprise setting. The partnership with IBM and Apple's other enterprise efforts will open those lines of communication. Stated differently, there is the potential here for a substantial "halo effect" from the iPad and iPhone that will benefit the Mac.
I'm actually pretty optimistic about this -- I think we are finally, finally getting close to Macs being accepted in the enterprise in large numbers.
Personally, I really don't think it matters all that much, the desktop PC paradigm is dying and mobile computer is ascending. Mobile means that the computer phoning into enterprise is less restrained in what OS it is operating on then the one wired into the network. Another issue is security which Apple adresses better then Windows. Recently when Home Depot was broken into they discovered the issue was deficiencies of Windows... their solution was to switch completely to Macs... google that one!
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Apple has that segment by the balls -- Education even favors Macs as well as iPads where enterprise is still heavy in PCs.
Try telling that to the LAUSD...please!
LAUSD wants to go exclusively with Apple products, but they stumbled badly with phase one and now need to pretend to consider alternatives. When the smoke clears, they will move to an Apple exclusive classroom like the rest of the country. All the big "wins" have gone to Apple in the last couple years.
Personally, I really don't think it matters all that much, the desktop PC paradigm is dying and mobile computer is ascending. Mobile means that the computer phoning into enterprise is less restrained in what OS it is operating on then the one wired into the network. Another issue is security which Apple adresses better then Windows. Recently when Home Depot was broken into they discovered the issue was deficiencies of Windows... their solution was to switch completely to Macs... google that one!
I think it's incorrect to say that desktop PCs are dying. Instead, I think the desktop PC is a very mature product that has achieved market saturation. New sales are mostly to replace obsolete or broken units, and obsolescence takes longer than it used to. Consequently, we see virtually no growth in PC sales. But a lack of growth should not be confused with the PC market dying, or PCs being irrelevant. For reasons of UI if nothing else, the PC can do things that a smartphone or tablet cannot.
Steve Jobs' truck vs cars analogy is a good one. Trucks are still around today and they serve useful purposes that cars cannot serve. In fact, many automakers find that trucks are more profitable than cars.
I think Apple's continued investment in the Mac shows that Apple understands the unique value of a Mac relative to iDevices. I'm optimistic that current Apple management sees the opportunity to sell more Macs in enterprise and will not miss that opportunity. Certainly it will take patience and a sustained effort to take advantage of that opportunity, but Apple has shown itself to be a company with plenty of patience and perseverance.
Personally, I really don't think it matters all that much, the desktop PC paradigm is dying and mobile computer is ascending. Mobile means that the computer phoning into enterprise is less restrained in what OS it is operating on then the one wired into the network. Another issue is security which Apple adresses better then Windows. Recently when Home Depot was broken into they discovered the issue was deficiencies of Windows... their solution was to switch completely to Macs... google that one!
I think it's incorrect to say that desktop PCs are dying. Instead, I think the desktop PC is a very mature product that has achieved market saturation. New sales are mostly to replace obsolete or broken units, and obsolescence takes longer than it used to. Consequently, we see virtually no growth in PC sales. But a lack of growth should not be confused with the PC market dying, or PCs being irrelevant. For reasons of UI if nothing else, the PC can do things that a smartphone or tablet cannot.
Steve Jobs' truck vs cars analogy is a good one. Trucks are still around today and they serve useful purposes that cars cannot serve. In fact, many automakers find that trucks are more profitable than cars.
I think Apple's continued investment in the Mac shows that Apple understands the unique value of a Mac relative to iDevices. I'm optimistic that current Apple management sees the opportunity to sell more Macs in enterprise and will not miss that opportunity. Certainly it will take patience and a sustained effort to take advantage of that opportunity, but Apple has shown itself to be a company with plenty of patience and perseverance.
you are basically correct, but still I didn't say that PC are being necessarily replaced with iDevices, I said mobile computers. Even in the stunning growth of Macs in this last quarter, it was the laptops that ate the biggest slice of that pie. Apple has the most desirable laptops and that has HP, Dell and the Chinese brands confounded. In addition the iDevices are trumping everyone else in all but the consumer market, and doing quite well there as well.
In all enterprise situations but those involving the worker bees confined to their cubicles, a mobile employee is more valuable to to the bottom line then ever, and that is why laptops and iDevices are so desirable. (In Jobs example, "trucks" included laptops)
I don't see Mac ever having more than a small segment of the Enterprise market. Microsoft is simply too entrenched and corporate bean counters are to wedded to the Wintel duopoly.
iPhone and to some degree iPad has made significant inroads and now account for the largest share of smartphone and tablet segments thus giving Apple a degree of penetration that Mac never did or will ever have in the Enterprise.
I see this partnership as being more important to IBM than to Apple. That's because IBM's hardware business is in steady decline and software and services revenues are not growing enough to fill the gap. Most of the apps, IBM is focused on, are vertical apps or front-end apps for their Big Data solutions. For Apple, selling to Enterprises has always been 'gravy'. For IBM, it's their core business and one they cannot afford to lose. That's my $.02...
It depends, if software shifts to a mobile first focus then native Mac Apps become far more viable as a key development barrier comes down. This should pave the way for higher OSX adoption. The procurement teams are being blinkered by corporate IT's desire to remain useful rather than pure numbers as Mac TCO is way lower than Windows.
This has been the way for a while but IBM-endorsed iOS could be the catalyst.
I think it is a matter of when, not if, that Apple will introduce a line of laptops based on An processors. The continued improvements they made with A8X show that current Macbook Air performance is not far off. Apple could introduce a line of ultra-portable laptops with lower price points from today's Air (due to reduced CPU/GPU costs) that would be quite suitable for the cost conscious education and enterprise markets, and carry same or better margins. Software of course is the key for making this work, but all of Apple's native apps of course would run on it, and Apple could certainly work with key partners like IBM to be on-board at launch. Most of enterprise applications are build for cloud with browser access now anyways, so all of those proprietary thick client applications are much less important than they used to be.
The battery life, reliability, and security of an An platform, together with reduced cost, would be attractive to some enterprises in replacing their aging laptops, when combined with the use of iOS devices. Continuity/handoff would really add productive value.
Are programming for the new iPad Large (just wink)
I really like Swift, but then again I have experience with one of its inspirations: C#. I've been blogging about it (russbishop.net). We haven't shipped any Swift code yet but it will happen any day now - several new features are written in it.
The reason Apple is not prominent in Enterprise/Business is cost and flexibility.
The cost has already been discussed so I won't go to into length. When you are considering a product that is normally twice the price of a Windows based product (Ad on appleinsider for 13" MacBook Pro $1193. Dell Inspiron 15" 5000 series $599) If a company has to buy 10 of those then $11K+ vice $6K is a substantial difference, especially if both will do the average office job (email, office (of some type), and web). And Ipad (which is closer to the price point) in it's current iteration by iOS is not flexible/mature enough to interact with VPN connections, file structures and network infrastructure.
However, the bigger hurdle is flexibility. The real reason you do not see Apple in Enterprise is that Apple is very insular when it comes to management of its devices. If a company buys a product, then said company should not be tied to Apple for management of the device. Real life story: company buys 5 iphones and issued to employees. One employee is terminated. Employee added personal itunes account to device. Had to call Apple support and 4 days later was able to remove itunes account from device and setup for new user.
Nowhere in the above scenario is there an end user way for IT to conduct a reset of the device. (MDM will remote wipe it, but the itunes account is still locked). Nor does Apple provide a utility for IT to manage devices. This is one example of many on how Apple is insular with having companies do things the Apple way. Apple servers were also a pain to setup and manage in an Enterprise (500+ clients) environment.
This is not to say that Apple products are inferior, (I have no less than 9 computers in my house and there is an ipad and Mac among them) But as someone who works in the IT field, I can tell you most clients (and I am talking CIO, CTO, etc) are going to really need see some change in the way Apple allows the IT departments to manage their devices before you see a big push in Enterprise.
Apple is looking to grab a bigger portion of the corporate software and solutions business with dedicated sales teams tasked with wooing big-name corporations, while at the same time working with software developers already entrenched in the enterprise sector.
Citing sources familiar with Apple's plan, Reuters reports the company is making big moves to expand its presence in enterprise, which include creating a dedicated sales force and forging strategic partnerships with software developers.
On the sales side, Apple has reportedly sent teams to talk to chief information officers heading up IT at large corporations. Financial services giant Citigroup is said to have been one target for Apple, but it is unclear if the firm signed on.
Sources claim Apple is working with software startups like ServiceMax and PlanGrid, which focus on enterprise solutions and apps. ServiceMax, an app designed to provide construction workers with easy access to blueprints, reportedly co-hosted eight marketing and sales dinners with Apple over the past year to show off their wares to CIOs and IT professionals.
Formal arrangements with other unnamed developers are also in the works, but none have been made public, these people said.
Shades of Apple's ambitions were seen in a recent partnership with IBM, which is just now bearing fruit. The two tech giants are working together to roll out "IBM MobileFirst for iOS," a blitz on multiple industries that incorporates custom-tailored software and services sold on iOS hardware.
In fact, the partnership appears to be the lynchpin in Apple's plans as IBM will provide enterprise-class software to rival current offerings from Oracle and Microsoft.
Last month, Apple CEO Tim Cook said IBM is preparing to roll out solutions across banking, government, insurance, retail, travel and transportation, and telecommunications sectors. Previously, IBM noted it had development of more than 100 different native iOS apps for the program.
Apple last week rolled out a new AppleCare for Enterprise website featuring hardware troubleshooting, on-site repairs and other services.
Apple Sales Reps are slick, but they can't hold a candle to the Windows Server and Linux Vendors. Also, Apple has't got a real line of Value Added Reps (the companies that resell their products with specialized software and/or hardware packages). They have a broad collection of assorted Developers, but that's not a corporate solution, and it will never rise to the Enterprise Level, not because of their products or proprietary OS and H/W, but because they don't have the staffing to teach, support, and grown corporate products.
It's one thing to code email applications to use Enterprise class email servers or use a secure networking tunnel. It's something else entirely to support a national or world-wide corporation with aggressive marketing demands, malware, viruses, hackers, and real world, untrained IT staff. Apple had an inside edge with their impressive coverage of the Education field, but their isn't any money in that venture. They need to break into the the Automotive industry (i.e. smarter cars), the Medical industry (tablets and document management), and Govt/Military (of which they have absolutely no clue).
I've seen Apple devices and computers in all of these industries, but without on-going training, they became obsolete and were left by the way side. Customers and VARs and Corporate IT professionals need on-going training to learn their jobs better and deliver IT services that help a company grow and protect it from hackers. Otherwise, they end up like Target or Home Depot, where even the most loyal customers are reluctant to pull out their credit card or sign-up for one, because under-trained or un-motivated IT people let hackers steal personal information from un-guarded databases.
If Apple is going to jump into the corporate world, what they have and use internally won't work. It's takes a village - a well trained village. Something that buying up a consultant company won't do for you (like HP and IBM have done for their Global Services - big flops).
The reason Apple is not prominent in Enterprise/Business is cost and flexibility.
The cost has already been discussed so I won't go to into length. When you are considering a product that is normally twice the price of a Windows based product (Ad on appleinsider for 13" MacBook Pro $1193. Dell Inspiron 15" 5000 series $599) If a company has to buy 10 of those then $11K+ vice $6K is a substantial difference, especially if both will do the average office job (email, office (of some type), and web). And Ipad (which is closer to the price point) in it's current iteration by iOS is not flexible/mature enough to interact with VPN connections, file structures and network infrastructure.
However, the bigger hurdle is flexibility. The real reason you do not see Apple in Enterprise is that Apple is very insular when it comes to management of its devices. If a company buys a product, then said company should not be tied to Apple for management of the device. Real life story: company buys 5 iphones and issued to employees. One employee is terminated. Employee added personal itunes account to device. Had to call Apple support and 4 days later was able to remove itunes account from device and setup for new user.
Nowhere in the above scenario is there an end user way for IT to conduct a reset of the device. (MDM will remote wipe it, but the itunes account is still locked). Nor does Apple provide a utility for IT to manage devices. This is one example of many on how Apple is insular with having companies do things the Apple way. Apple servers were also a pain to setup and manage in an Enterprise (500+ clients) environment.
This is not to say that Apple products are inferior, (I have no less than 9 computers in my house and there is an ipad and Mac among them) But as someone who works in the IT field, I can tell you most clients (and I am talking CIO, CTO, etc) are going to really need see some change in the way Apple allows the IT departments to manage their devices before you see a big push in Enterprise.
Good point, but that's a "Retail" view and Apple has a very high profit margin on their retail line. Corporate IT packages are easy to price out on the "iron" (H/W), but very hard to compete in the added value area (S/W, databases, networking, marketing, etc.). That's where IBM and HP dominate (and why I think HP is spinning off their Printer/PC business). Corporations look at the whole package (price, support, implementation, market penetration or dominance, future migration and continued customer loyalty. Apple really could care less about end-users and they can't getting into the larger IT departments with that "Surfer Dude" californian attitude. (IMHO)
The reason Apple is not prominent in Enterprise/Business is cost and flexibility.
The cost has already been discussed so I won't go to into length. When you are considering a product that is normally twice the price of a Windows based product (Ad on appleinsider for 13" MacBook Pro $1193. Dell Inspiron 15" 5000 series $599) If a company has to buy 10 of those then $11K+ vice $6K is a substantial difference, especially if both will do the average office job (email, office (of some type), and web). And Ipad (which is closer to the price point) in it's current iteration by iOS is not flexible/mature enough to interact with VPN connections, file structures and network infrastructure.
However, the bigger hurdle is flexibility. The real reason you do not see Apple in Enterprise is that Apple is very insular when it comes to management of its devices. If a company buys a product, then said company should not be tied to Apple for management of the device. Real life story: company buys 5 iphones and issued to employees. One employee is terminated. Employee added personal itunes account to device. Had to call Apple support and 4 days later was able to remove itunes account from device and setup for new user.
Nowhere in the above scenario is there an end user way for IT to conduct a reset of the device. (MDM will remote wipe it, but the itunes account is still locked). Nor does Apple provide a utility for IT to manage devices. This is one example of many on how Apple is insular with having companies do things the Apple way. Apple servers were also a pain to setup and manage in an Enterprise (500+ clients) environment.
This is not to say that Apple products are inferior, (I have no less than 9 computers in my house and there is an ipad and Mac among them) But as someone who works in the IT field, I can tell you most clients (and I am talking CIO, CTO, etc) are going to really need see some change in the way Apple allows the IT departments to manage their devices before you see a big push in Enterprise.
And Apple are changing their attitudes and product offerings for Enterprise which is a big mistake. Current enterprise IT practices (several of which you outline above) are disgracefully counter-productive and should be eliminated.
Don't get me wrong, all corporate services functions mean well but are simply unqualified to grasp the destructive non-technical impact of their technical decisions. Decisions they should never have allowed to make. I'm afraid most Executives throw the baby out with the bathwater and rather than retain all decision-making within the business, using Service Ops for consultation and execution, they delegate the whole package.
After all, why spend an extra 20% on hardware when you can spend an extra 1000% on irrelevant people & product licenses which fail to pay for themselves in 9/10 businesses?
Apple Sales Reps are slick, but they can't hold a candle to the Windows Server and Linux Vendors.
Linux has vendors? How do they pay them? Do they just recruit from white collar crime prisons for community service?
“Oh, you’re in for embezzlement of company funds? But it says here you have four years of experience with Novell products and a BA in advertising. I think we might have something for you...”
Comments
I don't see Mac ever having more than a small segment of the Enterprise market. Microsoft is simply too entrenched and corporate bean counters are to wedded to the Wintel duopoly.
How do you define small?
I'm thinking the Mac could eventually reach between 10% and 20% of the enterprise market in the US. Some might call that small, but it would be huge to both Apple and Microsoft, because Apple would be taking that share off the top.
I really don't think bean counting is that big of an obstacle to the Mac achieving a 10 to 20% share in the enterprise. The top 10 to 20% of employees in a firm ("top" in terms of rank in the hierarchy, salary, productivity, etc) can easily win a battle over cost.
The real obstacles are technical, but Apple has been slowly addressing those over the years. Three big things that have changed in the last ten years are: (1) Macs have greatly improved built-in support for Microsoft technologies like Exchange and SMB, (2) Macs have much better security features today (FileVault is very important in some contexts), and (3) IE6 has been supplanted by WebKit as the industry standard. That third one might be the biggest win of all for the Mac (even though the battle was fought by the iPhone).
There are probably some more technical issues that need to be addressed that I'm unaware of, but I think we're getting to the point where there really aren't major technical obstacles to having Macs in the enterprise. Once we get to that point, the biggest obstacle will just be communication --- helping IT understand that those technical obstacles are gone and that Macs really can coexist with PCs in an enterprise setting. The partnership with IBM and Apple's other enterprise efforts will open those lines of communication. Stated differently, there is the potential here for a substantial "halo effect" from the iPad and iPhone that will benefit the Mac.
I'm actually pretty optimistic about this -- I think we are finally, finally getting close to Macs being accepted in the enterprise in large numbers.
Believe it or not, people said the same about IBM -- in fact, even more vehemently -- 30 years ago.
Good. Now let’s get a dedicated sales team for education. Get ‘em when they’re children and they’ll be Apple for life.
Perhaps an in-school program combining iNdoctrination & iNoculation?
Apple has that segment by the balls -- Education even favors Macs as well as iPads where enterprise is still heavy in PCs.
Try telling that to the LAUSD...please!
IF that happened (10% to 20% of management) then you are right and that would happen. The tipping point for widespread adoption is between 17% to 19% according to history. Top tier management (especially sales and marketing) has already demanded that IT "find a way" to accommodate MacBook Air into the infra-structure.
Microsoft has made it difficult for other desk OS to work well in a Wintel-rich enviornment by building in stumbling blokcs... for some reason that self-serving wall isn't working as well as it once did.
Personally, I really don't think it matters all that much, the desktop PC paradigm is dying and mobile computer is ascending. Mobile means that the computer phoning into enterprise is less restrained in what OS it is operating on then the one wired into the network. Another issue is security which Apple adresses better then Windows. Recently when Home Depot was broken into they discovered the issue was deficiencies of Windows... their solution was to switch completely to Macs... google that one!
LAUSD wants to go exclusively with Apple products, but they stumbled badly with phase one and now need to pretend to consider alternatives. When the smoke clears, they will move to an Apple exclusive classroom like the rest of the country. All the big "wins" have gone to Apple in the last couple years.
Personally, I really don't think it matters all that much, the desktop PC paradigm is dying and mobile computer is ascending. Mobile means that the computer phoning into enterprise is less restrained in what OS it is operating on then the one wired into the network. Another issue is security which Apple adresses better then Windows. Recently when Home Depot was broken into they discovered the issue was deficiencies of Windows... their solution was to switch completely to Macs... google that one!
I think it's incorrect to say that desktop PCs are dying. Instead, I think the desktop PC is a very mature product that has achieved market saturation. New sales are mostly to replace obsolete or broken units, and obsolescence takes longer than it used to. Consequently, we see virtually no growth in PC sales. But a lack of growth should not be confused with the PC market dying, or PCs being irrelevant. For reasons of UI if nothing else, the PC can do things that a smartphone or tablet cannot.
Steve Jobs' truck vs cars analogy is a good one. Trucks are still around today and they serve useful purposes that cars cannot serve. In fact, many automakers find that trucks are more profitable than cars.
I think Apple's continued investment in the Mac shows that Apple understands the unique value of a Mac relative to iDevices. I'm optimistic that current Apple management sees the opportunity to sell more Macs in enterprise and will not miss that opportunity. Certainly it will take patience and a sustained effort to take advantage of that opportunity, but Apple has shown itself to be a company with plenty of patience and perseverance.
you are basically correct, but still I didn't say that PC are being necessarily replaced with iDevices, I said mobile computers. Even in the stunning growth of Macs in this last quarter, it was the laptops that ate the biggest slice of that pie. Apple has the most desirable laptops and that has HP, Dell and the Chinese brands confounded. In addition the iDevices are trumping everyone else in all but the consumer market, and doing quite well there as well.
In all enterprise situations but those involving the worker bees confined to their cubicles, a mobile employee is more valuable to to the bottom line then ever, and that is why laptops and iDevices are so desirable. (In Jobs example, "trucks" included laptops)
It depends, if software shifts to a mobile first focus then native Mac Apps become far more viable as a key development barrier comes down. This should pave the way for higher OSX adoption. The procurement teams are being blinkered by corporate IT's desire to remain useful rather than pure numbers as Mac TCO is way lower than Windows.
This has been the way for a while but IBM-endorsed iOS could be the catalyst.
I think it is a matter of when, not if, that Apple will introduce a line of laptops based on An processors. The continued improvements they made with A8X show that current Macbook Air performance is not far off. Apple could introduce a line of ultra-portable laptops with lower price points from today's Air (due to reduced CPU/GPU costs) that would be quite suitable for the cost conscious education and enterprise markets, and carry same or better margins. Software of course is the key for making this work, but all of Apple's native apps of course would run on it, and Apple could certainly work with key partners like IBM to be on-board at launch. Most of enterprise applications are build for cloud with browser access now anyways, so all of those proprietary thick client applications are much less important than they used to be.
The battery life, reliability, and security of an An platform, together with reduced cost, would be attractive to some enterprises in replacing their aging laptops, when combined with the use of iOS devices. Continuity/handoff would really add productive value.
I really like Swift, but then again I have experience with one of its inspirations: C#. I've been blogging about it (russbishop.net). We haven't shipped any Swift code yet but it will happen any day now - several new features are written in it.
As for future iPad products, I have no comment.
xenadu obviously wasn't born yesterday.
Lol - nice try Dick !
The reason Apple is not prominent in Enterprise/Business is cost and flexibility.
The cost has already been discussed so I won't go to into length. When you are considering a product that is normally twice the price of a Windows based product (Ad on appleinsider for 13" MacBook Pro $1193. Dell Inspiron 15" 5000 series $599) If a company has to buy 10 of those then $11K+ vice $6K is a substantial difference, especially if both will do the average office job (email, office (of some type), and web). And Ipad (which is closer to the price point) in it's current iteration by iOS is not flexible/mature enough to interact with VPN connections, file structures and network infrastructure.
However, the bigger hurdle is flexibility. The real reason you do not see Apple in Enterprise is that Apple is very insular when it comes to management of its devices. If a company buys a product, then said company should not be tied to Apple for management of the device. Real life story: company buys 5 iphones and issued to employees. One employee is terminated. Employee added personal itunes account to device. Had to call Apple support and 4 days later was able to remove itunes account from device and setup for new user.
Nowhere in the above scenario is there an end user way for IT to conduct a reset of the device. (MDM will remote wipe it, but the itunes account is still locked). Nor does Apple provide a utility for IT to manage devices. This is one example of many on how Apple is insular with having companies do things the Apple way. Apple servers were also a pain to setup and manage in an Enterprise (500+ clients) environment.
This is not to say that Apple products are inferior, (I have no less than 9 computers in my house and there is an ipad and Mac among them) But as someone who works in the IT field, I can tell you most clients (and I am talking CIO, CTO, etc) are going to really need see some change in the way Apple allows the IT departments to manage their devices before you see a big push in Enterprise.
Apple is looking to grab a bigger portion of the corporate software and solutions business with dedicated sales teams tasked with wooing big-name corporations, while at the same time working with software developers already entrenched in the enterprise sector.
Citing sources familiar with Apple's plan, Reuters reports the company is making big moves to expand its presence in enterprise, which include creating a dedicated sales force and forging strategic partnerships with software developers.
On the sales side, Apple has reportedly sent teams to talk to chief information officers heading up IT at large corporations. Financial services giant Citigroup is said to have been one target for Apple, but it is unclear if the firm signed on.
Sources claim Apple is working with software startups like ServiceMax and PlanGrid, which focus on enterprise solutions and apps. ServiceMax, an app designed to provide construction workers with easy access to blueprints, reportedly co-hosted eight marketing and sales dinners with Apple over the past year to show off their wares to CIOs and IT professionals.
Formal arrangements with other unnamed developers are also in the works, but none have been made public, these people said.
Shades of Apple's ambitions were seen in a recent partnership with IBM, which is just now bearing fruit. The two tech giants are working together to roll out "IBM MobileFirst for iOS," a blitz on multiple industries that incorporates custom-tailored software and services sold on iOS hardware.
In fact, the partnership appears to be the lynchpin in Apple's plans as IBM will provide enterprise-class software to rival current offerings from Oracle and Microsoft.
Last month, Apple CEO Tim Cook said IBM is preparing to roll out solutions across banking, government, insurance, retail, travel and transportation, and telecommunications sectors. Previously, IBM noted it had development of more than 100 different native iOS apps for the program.
Apple last week rolled out a new AppleCare for Enterprise website featuring hardware troubleshooting, on-site repairs and other services.
Apple Sales Reps are slick, but they can't hold a candle to the Windows Server and Linux Vendors. Also, Apple has't got a real line of Value Added Reps (the companies that resell their products with specialized software and/or hardware packages). They have a broad collection of assorted Developers, but that's not a corporate solution, and it will never rise to the Enterprise Level, not because of their products or proprietary OS and H/W, but because they don't have the staffing to teach, support, and grown corporate products.
It's one thing to code email applications to use Enterprise class email servers or use a secure networking tunnel. It's something else entirely to support a national or world-wide corporation with aggressive marketing demands, malware, viruses, hackers, and real world, untrained IT staff. Apple had an inside edge with their impressive coverage of the Education field, but their isn't any money in that venture. They need to break into the the Automotive industry (i.e. smarter cars), the Medical industry (tablets and document management), and Govt/Military (of which they have absolutely no clue).
I've seen Apple devices and computers in all of these industries, but without on-going training, they became obsolete and were left by the way side. Customers and VARs and Corporate IT professionals need on-going training to learn their jobs better and deliver IT services that help a company grow and protect it from hackers. Otherwise, they end up like Target or Home Depot, where even the most loyal customers are reluctant to pull out their credit card or sign-up for one, because under-trained or un-motivated IT people let hackers steal personal information from un-guarded databases.
If Apple is going to jump into the corporate world, what they have and use internally won't work. It's takes a village - a well trained village. Something that buying up a consultant company won't do for you (like HP and IBM have done for their Global Services - big flops).
The reason Apple is not prominent in Enterprise/Business is cost and flexibility.
The cost has already been discussed so I won't go to into length. When you are considering a product that is normally twice the price of a Windows based product (Ad on appleinsider for 13" MacBook Pro $1193. Dell Inspiron 15" 5000 series $599) If a company has to buy 10 of those then $11K+ vice $6K is a substantial difference, especially if both will do the average office job (email, office (of some type), and web). And Ipad (which is closer to the price point) in it's current iteration by iOS is not flexible/mature enough to interact with VPN connections, file structures and network infrastructure.
However, the bigger hurdle is flexibility. The real reason you do not see Apple in Enterprise is that Apple is very insular when it comes to management of its devices. If a company buys a product, then said company should not be tied to Apple for management of the device. Real life story: company buys 5 iphones and issued to employees. One employee is terminated. Employee added personal itunes account to device. Had to call Apple support and 4 days later was able to remove itunes account from device and setup for new user.
Nowhere in the above scenario is there an end user way for IT to conduct a reset of the device. (MDM will remote wipe it, but the itunes account is still locked). Nor does Apple provide a utility for IT to manage devices. This is one example of many on how Apple is insular with having companies do things the Apple way. Apple servers were also a pain to setup and manage in an Enterprise (500+ clients) environment.
This is not to say that Apple products are inferior, (I have no less than 9 computers in my house and there is an ipad and Mac among them) But as someone who works in the IT field, I can tell you most clients (and I am talking CIO, CTO, etc) are going to really need see some change in the way Apple allows the IT departments to manage their devices before you see a big push in Enterprise.
Good point, but that's a "Retail" view and Apple has a very high profit margin on their retail line. Corporate IT packages are easy to price out on the "iron" (H/W), but very hard to compete in the added value area (S/W, databases, networking, marketing, etc.). That's where IBM and HP dominate (and why I think HP is spinning off their Printer/PC business). Corporations look at the whole package (price, support, implementation, market penetration or dominance, future migration and continued customer loyalty. Apple really could care less about end-users and they can't getting into the larger IT departments with that "Surfer Dude" californian attitude. (IMHO)
And Apple are changing their attitudes and product offerings for Enterprise which is a big mistake. Current enterprise IT practices (several of which you outline above) are disgracefully counter-productive and should be eliminated.
Don't get me wrong, all corporate services functions mean well but are simply unqualified to grasp the destructive non-technical impact of their technical decisions. Decisions they should never have allowed to make. I'm afraid most Executives throw the baby out with the bathwater and rather than retain all decision-making within the business, using Service Ops for consultation and execution, they delegate the whole package.
After all, why spend an extra 20% on hardware when you can spend an extra 1000% on irrelevant people & product licenses which fail to pay for themselves in 9/10 businesses?
Linux has vendors? How do they pay them? Do they just recruit from white collar crime prisons for community service?
“Oh, you’re in for embezzlement of company funds? But it says here you have four years of experience with Novell products and a BA in advertising. I think we might have something for you...”