Mobility Trends in 2012 and Beyond

You know you need to be in the mobility market or at least embrace it for your customers, but are you struggling with how to capitalize on the opportunity and challenges mobility presents?  A panel of mobility experts at CompTIA’s Annual Member Meeting offered some answers for IT solutions providers struggling with that question.

There’s no denying the growing trend of mobility.  Mobile device shipments eclipsed PC shipments for the first time 2011. Tablet shipments are expected to exceed 100 million units in 2012, up 50 percent year-over-year.  Since 2009, mobile Internet usage has doubled every year. Annual mobile app downloads are projected to grow more than 10 times over from 2010 to 2015 – from 10.7 billion to 183 billion.  Eight-five percent of executives work remotely at least occasionally; 53 percent work remotely frequently, according to CompTIA market research.  All of those stats point to the overwhelming wave of mobility.

Dan Wensley, VP of Level Platforms Inc., commented that there are three main focuses for IT staff when it comes to mobility: provision, security and end-of-life.  The solution provider must be able to help the customer:

1. Supply mobile devices for their staff,


2. Secure them and


3. Cut off access to company data when the employee leaves the company.

Tim Herbert, VP of market research for CompTIA, mentioned that very few corporations have a mobility policy written out.  Employees often decide on which mobile device they want to use.

“IT teams must be able to react to the new devices coming in,” Michael Chase, COO of ActivateIT, said.  “As solution providers, we can be the experts to help those IT teams handle all the different mobile devices.”

Vince Plaza, VP of TeamLogic IT, added, “We can’t change the culture and make the user take a different device.  It’s an opportunity, but it’s very challenging.”  Plaza said that customers are not asking for IT staff to manage their devices; they want to keep it personal -- a direct opposite position that exists with laptops.

However Wensley gave an opposite viewpoint, saying that 85 percent of resellers they deal with have said they had been approached by customers to manage mobile devices, especially with customers that give mobile devices to employees versus BYOD (bring your own device) clients.

Wensley added, “There is margin in mystery and complexity.”  With the changes coming into the IT industry, it opens up opportunities for IT solution providers to be the expert for their customers. This is not about break/fix; it’s about reliability, security and access.