“When Ashi Hoseini, manager of mobile solutions for Scandinavian Airlines (SAS), began talking to IBM about creating apps that might help the airline’s crews be more efficient, she got the kind of offer many techies can only dream about: An offer to fly to Cupertino and work directly with Apple developers at the company’s headquarters,” Chris O’Brien writes for VentureBeat. “A few days later, she and her team left with a new app SAS crews can use on iOS devices. (The app will be rolling out soon.)”
“IBM and Apple have created dedicated teams that work from the Apple campus, helping customers like SAS develop apps that meet their specific needs. While Apple has lots of developer outreach, teaching businesses to use enterprise apps is a far more complex proposition, because such apps likely have to plug into existing infrastructure and databases to work seamlessly,” O’Brien writes. “In other words, these are not just two programmers building another photo sharing app.”
“So far, the partnership between Apple and IBM has led to the creation of 100 enterprise apps,” O’Brien writes. “If that doesn’t sound like a huge number, remember that when these get rolled out at massive companies, they drive the need to buy large quantities of Apple gadgets and IBM data and consulting services.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: The value and potential of the Apple+IBM partnership cannot be overstated.
SEE ALSO:
IBM just gave Apple even more enterprise credibility – February 23, 2016
Apple Inc., the enterprise IT company – December 15, 2015
Tim Cook: Apple’s enterprise business is already at $25 billion annually – September 29, 2015
Apple’s surprising new passion: The enterprise – September 9, 2015
The Apple+Cisco deal may change the world – not just the enterprise – September 1, 2015
Apple aims to boost enterprise iPad and iPhone sales with new Cisco partnership – August 31, 2015
Apple and Cisco partner to deliver fast lane for iOS enterprise users – August 31, 2015
Apple+IBM: Enterprise apps go wearable on Apple Watch – May 24, 2015
Apple+IBM’s MobileFirst strikes iPhone and iPad app partnership with China Telecom – April 2, 2015
Apple+IBM add 8 powerful new MobileFirst enterprise apps for iPad and iPhone – April 1, 2015
Apple+IBM partnership is more than a simple hardware distribution deal – February 28, 2015
UBS: Apple+IBM partnership set to expand – February 9, 2015
Apple+IBM: Apple spoils early, Big Blue’s later? – February 2, 2015
Apple+IBM seize the mobile moment to energize enterprise software – December 29, 2014
Man did I need their help 20 years ago at work. We poor Mac users where treated like gum stuck under the IT shoes. Constantly trying to scrape us off them. lol
I very much like this approach. It’s a lot of work for IBM and Apple to take on the coding of these apps. But the quality is going to be incredibly better than if they simply shoved off the coding to the Enterprise companies who are in no way qualified to write their own software.
I’ll must point out, however, that Apple is still required to sort out their Enterprise developer security certificate system, which I rate as poor. Ideally, a security certificate should be married to an app as intimately as possible. When an app is updated, the security certificate should be updated to match that new app. That’s where we’re going and Apple has to get there asap.
Example: A security certificate maintains validity ONLY if the a hash of the accompanying app matches the hash value held in the certificate. That means if the app is change IN ANY WAY, the security certificate becomes INVALID. The current hash standard is SHA-2, as in SHA-256 or better. That’s one approach.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SHA-2
What Apple allows at the moment is the robbery of an Enterprise security certificate, inserting it into any old malware app pretending to be the certified app. That malware appears to be approved by Apple, acts as Trojan horse malware, is social engineered onto some sucker’s computer and they get PWNed until Apple catches on and whacks the certificate, too late to stop the malware’s damage. Poor idea.
How is this collaboration a big deal for Apple? Almost no one sees any value of this collaboration as helping Apple gain any traction in the enterprise. It’s likely good for IBM and it has certainly boosted IBM’s value. Most of these apps are going to be used on iPads, right? Everyone sees iPads as a dead-end business for Apple and these apps don’t seem to be helping Apple sell more iPads. Since the collaboration, Apple has been selling even less iPads, so how can the deal been seen as beneficial for Apple? As near as I can tell, no one who matters sees Apple as having any enterprise chops. Microsoft is the main company who is given credit for owning the enterprise and Apple doesn’t even come close. Enterprise entry or not, Apple is still valued as a dying company which pretty much indicates how much the Apple/IBM partnership is worth to Apple and investors.
I am sorry to say, your reasoning seems completely backwards on many levels. I officially endorse you to become a member of “Confused Country”.
as the administrator of a couple of thousand ipads, i want to know why Apple wont give us the ability to remotely lock them to a specified ios version. it causes endless headaches when users update before custom apps can be updated and validated
IBM thing sounds promising though.. maybe i can score a trip to Cupertino