Toward the mobile enterprise, step by step

10-point evaluation framework A look at 3G? impact 3G outlook

Mobility in the enterprise has been - like wireless coverage - spotty. Too many "gotchas" have prevailed: unreliable and slow networks, deficient devices, underdeveloped billing and customer care systems, and lack of focus by the major wireless operators. These factors made for complex wireless projects involving a veritable circus of middleware, gateway and system integrator vendors. As a result, outside of BlackBerry, which counts about 1 million users worldwide, we've not seen broad adoption of wireless data in the enterprise. In fact, research shows that the global market for downloading ring tones exceeds that for enterprise wireless data services today.

But in the past two years, we've seen progress on several fronts:

• Wireless networks have improved. Coverage is better, and 2.5G networks such as General Packet Radio Service/Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution and Code Division Multiple Access 1x boast always-on capability and offer speeds of one to three times that of dial-up. (How much faster depends on a number of factors, such as distance from base station and capacity loading.)
  
• We finally have a suite of business-class devices, across multiple operating systems. Whether phone or PDA-phone combinations, these devices support much greater memory (up to 64M byte on board, with many having some form of removable storage) and faster processors (we'll see the first 1-GHz processor on a phone by next year). Sample business-class devices include the BlackBerry, palmOne Treo (Palm OS), Samsung i700 (Microsoft Pocket PC) and Sony Ericsson P900 (Symbian).
  
• Wireless carriers have improved support for the enterprise. Most have dedicated support for midsize to large companies, separate care centers for data and improved billing systems. All have expanded their technical sales resources. Their security story also has evolved.

With such advancements, companies now can take wireless to the next level. Doing so requires two steps. First, you must develop a company-wide mobility strategy that includes a holistic view of wireless: voice and data, in-building as well as mobile, and including plans for WANs and wireless LANs. Second, as wireless becomes a core component of new data center plans, you must deploy wireless to a much larger group of enterprise users.

10-point evaluation framework

This 10-point framework will help you determine whether it's time to dive into enterprise mobility and how to evaluate vendor solutions:

1. Enterprise mobility requirements. We define a mobile worker as one who is away from his primary workplace at least 20% of the time. Approximately one-third of the U.S. workforce, or about 50 million users, falls into this category. Once you have determined whether an employee is a mobile worker, you need to better understand his particular wireless requirements: campus, local, regional, national, international.

2. Applications. Does the employee primarily need remote access plus mobile e-mail and personal information management - meaning access to contacts and calendar? Or does the employee need more vertically oriented solutions such as field-force automation or other applications that might require custom development or, at a minimum, some form of wireless remote access? Also consider whether the employee needs constant connection to the application or whether he can work offline and then remote access in or synchronize the data.