Many are calling 2013 the year of enterprise apps. A quick google search reveals a host of articles echoing that proclamation. It’s one we welcome because we’ve seen it evolving rapidly toward this point for the past two years.
Typical of prediction wisdom, we’ll be the first to say that this insight is half right.
Welcoming enterprise apps is, for us, like talking to that brother-in-law you have who’s about 12 to 18 months behind the tech curve. You know the guy who got his first iPod on Christmas then wore you out New Year’s Eve explaining how great it was to have all his music on one device? You nod politely, quietly thinking, “yeah, dude, I think my old 5G from 2003 is somewhere in my junk drawer.”
That sounds snobby, but we’re basing that on real confidence in the impact of enterprise mobility. And we base that confidence on three big realizations:
1. We had a tremendous Q4 in 2012. Record customer acquisition across several verticals. It was a great way to end the year as a company, and powerful indicator of where our industry is going.
2. People are talking about enterprise mobility with enthusiasm that rivals consumer mobility. This speaks to what we were saying above, that tech writers and IT pundits are really getting into enterprise mobile app particulars. It’s no longer a novelty or even a cool little phenomenon. It’s becoming a business imperative and it’s being recognized as such.
Just a few examples:
Yankee Group: Will 2013 be the Year for Enterprise Apps?
Forbes: Trends Affecting Enterprise Mobility in 2013
InfoWeek: Seven Enterprise Mobility Predictions for 2013
What’s interesting is the thread of “maturity” running through these articles, meaning the notion that enterprise mobility itself has arrived. And there are great companies like Appcelerator and AnyPresence committed to fast, effective enterprise mobile app development.
For us, this all speaks to the fact that mobility is hitting that threshold of inevitable exponential adoption. But as an innovation, enterprise mobility has already been here for a couple years.
That brings us to point 3: Enterprise mobile app management. We don’t see the slew of New Year’s observations regarding mobile apps in the enterprise as predictions. For us, it’s confirmation.
So for the year ahead, you’re going to hear us reiterate and amplify our message about the imperative of enterprise mobile app management. The app builds are underway. The app stores are being developed. Make sure you’re managing that development, deployment and distribution. Make sure you’re addressing security concerns, pushing the latest versions to your people with ease, and maintaining the managerial visibility essential to optimal usage and user retention.
All said, it should indeed be a tremendous year for enterprise mobility. But we knew that already.
