Solutions Review 2016 Mobile Device Management Prediction

Enterprise mobility has been a hot topic for the past several years, from what makes an MDM solution one of the best, to what the future holds for enterprise mobility. After spending the entire year reading, researching and interviewing professionals in the enterprise mobile space, I’ve come to a few conclusions  of my own.

Gartner has, not so effectively tried to re-label Mobile Device Management (MDM) as Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM). While it makes sense as we move away from securing just devices to including MDM in the bigger picture of mobile device security. While MDM is the foundation of EMM, there has been a lot more to consider than just securing the device.

It’s not secret that I am a fan of Virtual Mobile Infrastructure (VMI) and containerization as ways of securing mobile devices. I’m more partial to these types of solutions because of the total control it gives IT over how and where their data is accessed, while also giving the user the privacy they seek with their personal information that is also stored on the devices.

Recently the topic of endpoint protection has come up: Is endpoint protection dead? It’s not exactly dead, but it’s on it’s way to the retirement home. With all of this cloud technology and gateways for access sensitive corporate data from the cloud, there isn’t really a reason to store any data on the device itself. Storing data on the device leaves room for human error with the IT department having to make sure that every employee updated their device on time, and haven’t downloaded any blacklisted apps.

Not only does VMI offer the extra security of off-device storage, but it also allows IT to update everything at once and perform maintenance and updates on the virtual OS rather than on the device itself; basically an employee could download some of the least secure apps be hacked, and still not compromise the corporate data because it’s not stored on the device. With a gateway that’s of a higher caliber of security than normal apps, it’s not going to be easily infiltrated. If the device is lost or stolen, instead of wiping the entire device, IT only needs to disable the gateway that way if the device is found, the personal data is still intact and the corporate data cannot be accessed.

2016 is going to be an interesting year for enterprise mobility for sure. We’re at a point where there are still plenty of enterprises and SMBs that have yet to adopt any kind of mobile security for their employees but there are also ones that have adopted it so fiercely that it has changed the way they structure and conduct their business. We will see a wider adoption of enterprise mobile security in general, but there will be a divide between those who understand where the technology is going, and those who are comfortable to just secure the endpoint and leave it at that.

We aren’t going to see too many developments where the main point of that mobile solution is to secure the endpoint. While endpoint security will still be relevant in some industries (those who don’t have continuous wireless internet access), we will see MDM and EMM solutions providers leaning towards cloud oriented solutions that can truly be accessed from anywhere without storing the actual data on the device. We will also be seeing solutions that are prepared to take on the Internet of Things (IoT) as that becomes more prevalent in the coming years.

See where the top solutions currently stand and if you can see where they’ll go in the coming year with the detailed, complementary  Gartner Critical Capabilities for High Security Mobile Management report.