Dec 06/Jan 07

As more and more enterprises introduce mobile computing as a matter of policy, the majority are tending to neglect the issue of how to manage their mobile devices once they are deployed.

So says mobility specialist B2M Solutions, which has taken soundings among 250 organisations planning on deploying mobile solutions during the next 12 months. It says a remarkable 80 per cent have neglected "the vital element" of device management.

Under this broad heading the company includes deployment of software and patches to the device population from a support centre, plus remote troubleshooting and problem resolution.

The company says organisations deploying first-generation mobile systems follow a common four-stage pattern. First they concentrate first on specifying their mobile devices; next they analyse the business requirements; then they customise applications to meet those needs; and finally they establish a robust and secure communications network.

Yet throughout this process, B2M says, they tend to ignore the challenge of managing and maintaining a large population of mobile devices.

Managing director Julie Purves likens the situation to the PC market ten years ago, before users realised integration was the essential ingredient. With mobile computing, device control and management are the comparable missing elements, she says, and are sometimes only full addressed when users progress to their second- or third-generation systems.