“Watch out Microsoft and Dell, Apple is coming after your bread and butter,” Cadie Thompson reports for CNBC.
“The iPhone and iPad maker is pushing into the business market, putting pressure on those hardware and software companies that have long relied on corporate clients for profits,” Thompson reports. “‘Apple is moving into the enterprise in a dramatic way, mostly with iPhones and iPads. It’s not dominating in computers yet, but it’s certainly growing,’ said Ted Schadler, a Forrester analyst.”
“The tech giant is doing everything from lowering the cost of its devices and giving away its software for free to ramping up security features to woo enterprise customers. And its efforts are working, analysts say,” Thompson reports. “In fact, Apple has already expanded its presence in businesses significantly in recent years. In North America, 18 percent of employees said they use an Apple device for work, according to Forrester data. Just a few years ago, that number was more in the 3 percent range, Schadler said. The biggest force driving Apple into the workforce is simply because consumers want it there.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: The days of the corporate IT doofus retarding progress and stifling productivity are over.
As the new waves of IT pros steeped in Apple hit, Microsoft and its barnacles will sink further into the abyss.
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iOS 7 is crippled from birth: no user accessible file system and a horrible, horrible user interface. I can’t think of a single business that will willingly adopt the crippled iPad as part of its employee process workflow.
I’d rather puke my guts out than face up to the horrible iOS 7 childlike icons.
You came out with your umbilical chord wrapped around your neck, cutting off your air supply and causing brain damage, didn’t you? I’m sorry you were crippled from birth.
Now, since you clearly don’t understand iOS, and care more about the visual aspects than the function, please show yourself the door.
Rob Enderle is back! Where ya been Rob?
Quit being such a botvinik and get on with your life.
Rob, no it is Hu Hung Low a troll paid for by Samsung attempting to steer the discussion to failure, which is absolutely laughably ludicrous.
So you want Apple to be just like MicroFuck?
Please forgive my step back into immaturity, go f yourself butt plug.
Nice troll. Do you really believe this or do you work for Microsoft?
Is the recently-released iWork actually supposed to be useful for business users?
If so, good luck selling that idea.
You got that right. To convince enterprise to switch means providing a product that is vastly better than Office and Windows. Current users are content and/or habituated with Office and Windows, and unwilling to change to iWork. Apple needs to demonstrate how OS X, iOS 7, and iWork are superior to the alternative, not just marginally better. So far, I don’t see Apple making a sufficient argument.
You may be right – for now. But there is a next generation of users growing up primarily on iDevices who are already learning to use iWork as a seamless platform across devices. As iWork iterates into a more versatile product, this next generation will bring it into the workplace. We long time Mac users have all seen this before.
😴
Oops. That was in reply to @Crippled, above.
Inevitably, once Apple attains dominance in the enterprise it won’t be long before Apple begins to act just like Microsoft has acted. There’s something about having a monopoly that creates an environment of passivity, lassitude, and poor customer service. Oh, how we will yearn for the good ol’ days when Apple was the underdog.
Gigantic differences between the cultures. Microsoft was always afraid that if they made the changes Windows needed, it would cause customers to examine alternatives. While Apple routinely devours its own for something better. Its in their DNA.
If Microsoft made the changes it “needed” this would have broadened their user base not finished it. As recent history has proven, Microsoft has not make the appropriate decisions and Monkey Boy is gone. Don’t think for a moment that new leadership cannot make Microsoft competitive again or, alternatively, that Apple isn’t immune from bad decisions.
“Don’t think for a moment that new leadership cannot make Microsoft competitive again”
You are right, it could very well do that, they still have a lot of money.
Now they only have to come up with a suitable business. Maybe manufacturing rubber boots, or something like that. As a software company they have NO experience of a successful formula in a non monopoly. The days when FUD was effective are gone, the internet provides information that is too widespread for MS to conceal or hide.
iPads are ideal for board room meetings: taking notes, searching the policy manual, passing around prototype sketches, querying corporate databases. That’s how they got started in corporate: brought into these rooms by CxOs, AVPs, and consultants for their convenience, reach, and outright usability. In time, it only made sense for IT to support decision-makers and their personal tools; and that inevitably trickled down to underlings. Apple didn’t push this business strategy — it was organic.
Now Apple can capitalise on this phenomenon as it sees fit. Even if they do little, enterprise has found a place for iOS and the caterwaulings of random commenters won’t change that.
Yes. There are many uses for a hand held device in the business world, from those you mentioned, to accessing databases on the warehouse floor, or even clerks greeting visitors and checking calendars, or basically any situation where accessing info, making minor corrections/updates, is just more convenient with a hand held device.
I do concur that the convenience of a large desktop screen for running multiple windows to do more intensive database updates, document creation requiring more robust tools and processing power, and just any situation requiring a large screen, is more appropriate. That’s what I find myself doing, anyway. My iPad moves around with me, but when I want to edit multiple records, or just browse the hundreds of records in iTunes, my large desktop screen makes that more productive.
I could easily see businesses changing to smaller and smaller areas set up for this intensive stuff with large screens, keyboards, track pads, and the rest of the workforce moving about with their iPads getting their jobs done.
Indeed, most executives in large companies only take notes, they don’t construct large documents.
iPads are perfect for that.
Years ago, I would see a Mac every month or so, when visiting businesses ….
Now I see one or two locations with Macs almost everyday and one customer in particular who was a BIG Blackberry and Windows fan who swore never Apple now has iMacs, iPhones and their CEO who never had a computer, ever, has an iPad …..
So at least in my little world and I’ve been watching since 1992, I see changes!
Anecdotal “evidence” is pure bullshit.
It may well be, but apparently, actual numbers seem in sync (in the article: 18% of people in enterprise now do their work on an Apple device, vs. 3% some years back).
You just have to open your eyes to see anecdotal evidence.
Anecdotal evidence isn’t. If opinion, hearsay, and unsubtantiated opinion drives your thinking I pity you.
Annecdotes become valuable when you add them all up.
Anecdotal evidence 10 years ago in Starbucks was that I was one of the very few with PowerBooks.
Anecdotal evidence from dozens of Starbucks today is somewhere around half of Starbucks users are on MacBooks and that doesn’t count the iPads and iPhones.
Now more than ever Apple needs to reexamine iTunes as the be-all-end-all application to support iDevices.
When an uninformed CEO, CFO or even I.T. decision maker hears “iTunes” as part of the iPad/iPhone implementation process the conversation is immediately sidetracked or derailed completely due to a myriad of concerns – some genuine, some nonsensical.
Apple needs to break iTunes up and create a dedicated application to support iDevices for business if they really want to make serious inroads in Enterprise.
If you are using more than one or two iOS devices in an organization, you are not using iTunes to manage them. Instead you are using Mavericks Server or Apple Configurator. In our 100% Windows shop we had to buy a MacBook Pro to initially run Configurator and then Mavericks Server and manage our 9 iPads.
Also, for a couple years I had two business accounts with my local Apple Store. Up until about 6 months ago, I never heard from the store unless I called them and needed something. But lately I get at least one unsolicited phone call per month from “my” Apple Business Rep at the local store asking how things are going, do I need anything, have I heard about this or than new product.
Based on my experience, I think the article is very accurate. Apple is going to the Enterprise market and this is nothing but a good thing.
My needs are somewhat specialized, but every time I discuss this at the Apple store they transfer me to the business specialist who is very eager to help.
“If you are using more than one or two iOS devices in an organization, you are not using iTunes to manage them.”
That is often the case however the last company I dealt with has over 10,000 employees with most in the field spread across the country and nowhere near HQ. All have iPads and use iTunes for syncing files, etc. That company’s size and structure is not unusual but is fairly progressive when it comes to understanding the Apple eco system.
Most others are not so willing to “enable” their employees when the word “iTunes” enters the conversation.
IMHO Apple needs to slim down the bloated application that iTunes has become even for personal use.
There’s no doubt Apple will continue to make inroads in Enterprise as employee demand rises but Apple needs to rethink iDevice implementation if they really want to challenge the status quo.
@ Golden, the App you are after already exists – it’s called Apple Configurator:
http://www.apple.com/uk/support/ipad/business/
And stupid Apple is not catering to it by replacing Xserve. Maybe xserve didn’t make a ton of money, but Apple is crazy not to have given an all-in solution for businesses who want Mac.