Steve Jobs never cared much for the corporate market; he was his charming self when he referred to corporate offices as “orifices.”
However, “orifices” everywhere are snatching up iPads, and iPhones for corporate use, to access the corporate intranet. One of Prescient’s clients has purchased 3,000 iPads for its staff, and plans to purchase 2,000 more. In fact, Apple’s new CEO Tim Cook recently boasted on an earnings call with analysts that 93% of the Fortune 500 are testing or deploying the iPhone; 92% of the Fortune 500 are testing or deploying the iPad.
“You never heard those stats before,” said Gene Munster, an analyst at Piper Jaffray, to the NY Times. “The reason why is they struggled for decades, and finally they have a story to tell in the enterprise.”
Ignored by Jobs – and with good reason, to focus on their core market – Apple is now most definitely interested in your workplace, and the hardware that accesses your intranet.
How can company’s make iPads and other tablets a worthwhile investment? The bigger the organization, the bigger the field and sales staff, the more likely an organization will invest in tablets and smart phones. An aberration today, expect a majority of medium to large organizations will be providing mobile access to sales and field workers within one or two years. In fact, as the NY Times reports, remote access to the intranet is quickly becoming a standard in some industries, such as the airline industry:
Airlines have begun to use iPads to replace printed aircraft flight manuals, navigation charts and other material that pilots are required to bring on board. The binders holding those manuals typically had to be popped open every few weeks by pilots so they could replace pages with updated information. With iPads, the updating occurs electronically.
All of Alaska Airlines’ more than 1,400 pilots now have iPads, and United and Continental Airlines, which have merged, started giving iPads to all 11,000 of their pilots in August.
“We’ve shown we can retrieve an electronic page faster than we can retrieve a printed manual,” said Capt. Joe Burns, a United pilot and managing director of technology and flight tests for the airline.
Not to be left behind, Google also wants a piece of your intranet – and they’ve got a head start thanks to Google Sites and Apps.
In fact, Google’s mobile platform Android is seeing rapid uptake similar to that of iPhone: Mobile device management vendor MobileIron claims it has gained 1,000 new enterprise customers in the last 10 months, reports Network World:
At least 50% of MobileIron’s customer base is deploying Android devices, mostly in pilot programs. (Today, Apple claims nine out of 10 Fortune 400 companies are deploying or testing iPhones and iPads.)
“As companies prep for 2012, we’re expecting increased pressure to adopt Android,” says Ojas Rege, vice president of products at MobileIron. “There will be a spike of Android devices coming to the enterprise after the holidays and a spike in the second half of the year as more devices are upgraded.”
And just in time for Christmas the new Amazon Kindle Fire tablet will give the iPad a serious run for its money: using the Android Gingerbread OS, it retails at only $199 and has already shipped 6 million units. You better believe more than a few organizations will look at that price tag and become buyers.
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People who pooh-pooh the iPhone haven’t used it. Once they get a chance to try it for a few minutes their jaws are on the floor and they’re hooked.