Instat published a report today, predicting that corporate spending on wireless voice and data services will outstrip spending on wireline services by 2010. The report is pitched at service providers, pointing out that corporate users are more profitable. Of course some service providers, like Sotto, already pin their strategy on this. The report also encourages corporations to unify their wireless spending, rather than have employees get their service piecemeal and expense it. I wrote about this in an earlier posting.
As cell phones get smarter and as they get more tightly bound into corporate networks, security becomes a major concern. This is the subject of two stories in today’s Wall Street Journal. The first tells how the iPhone is precipitating a standoff between IT managers who don’t want it on their networks, and users who want to use it as a corporate email client. The second explains how iPods, iPhones and any device with storage and a USB connector constitute network security threats.
My May column in Internet Telephony Magazine is about the Jericho Forum, which proposes a radical solution to the security concerns of the wireless enterprise.
That’s a pretty impressive statistic that corporate spending on wireless voice and data services will outstrip spending on wireline services by 2010. That stat also further demonstrates the need companies will have for enterprise wireless management. As more and more companies take advantage of a mobile workforce, IT managers will need help managing the acquisition, deployment and the ongoing management of cellular voice and data access. Movero Technology is on of the early adopters of enterprise wireless management and is helping companies simplify the process. Movero Technology
There is a counterbalancing story in today’s Wall Street Journal: “Helpless, Hopeless, Wireless.” The message is that Wi-Fi is insecure and a big headache for IT departments, who are resisting it as a result. The story quotes Del’Oro numbers that say that corporate spending on Wi-Fi in 2005 and 2006 was $917 million and $1.3 billion respectively, compared with $16 billion in 2006 on wired networking equipment. The story was packed with cautionary anecdotes but it gave a good puff to Aruba.
I kept going back to those 2005 and 2006 numbers: a very healthy 42% year-on-year growth.