Macs Landing on Corporate Desks, Led by iPhones and iPads

[MacRumors]

In the past 5 years, Apple's push into the enterprise has been led by the iPhone and the iPad. Corporate IT departments, long dominated by the BlackBerry, are becoming more receptive to iOS products, especially when users are given the choice about which platform to use.

In addition to iOS driving up Apple's sales -- accounting for some two-thirds of Apple's revenue in fact -- iOS's corporate success is driving enterprise adoption of the Mac. The Wall Street Journal writes of Apple's growing success in getting the Mac onto the desks of corporate employees. GE has more than 1,000 Mac users under a year-long pilot project that allows employees to choose to use Macs instead of PC's, without any significant knowledge of the program inside GE. The company has 330,000 computers, the vast majority running Windows.

GE started offering its employees the iPhone as an alternative to BlackBerrys in 2008. Now, it says about 10,000 GE employees carry the Apple smartphone, compared with 50,000 using BlackBerrys.

The Fairfield, Conn., conglomerate hasn't trumpeted the Apple option for computers and laptops internally, and as a result employee awareness is limited.

But staffers across GE businesses are eligible as long as there aren't security clearance issues, such as devices for defense work, or big compatibility problems with needed software.

"All businesses are participating at some level in making this [option] available to their employees," said Greg Simpson, GE's chief technology officer.

"To find out that we support Apple, we support iPhones, we support Macs, it does take away one question for people, 'Are they a contemporary company or not?'" Mr. Simpson said. "I think that is a recruiting-positive thing."

Forrester Research estimates that Apple will sell $9 billion in Macs and $10 billion in iPads to corporations this year, up 50% from 2011. Forrester anticipates spending on PCs and tablets made by other companies will decline by 3% to $69 billion.

Article Link: Macs Landing on Corporate Desks, Led by iPhones and iPads

 

[dokujaryu]

NASA recently allowed people to chose their platform. Macs are blowing up all over the place now, they are having a hard time keeping up with demand.

 

[adildacoolset]

who said that windows is best for corporate use? Hah, and if they switched it means that they tried windows but switched to mac

 

[alent1234]

NASA recently allowed people to chose their platform. Macs are blowing up all over the place now, they are having a hard time keeping up with demand.

if my employer offered to buy me a $2000 MBP compared to a cheapo $500 laptop i'd be all over it as well. mostly for bragging rights

when BB's first came out it was the same way, everyone wanted one and it was a status thing. same with laptops. now it's apple stuff

 

[mobi]

Even more so now that we are in the "post pc era." Mac+iOS play better

 

[lilo777]

Why would any corporation choose to use iMacs? Apple does not offer corporate friendly desktop designs. More importantly, corporate hate to be dependent on a single supplier (and as far as I know nobody but Apple sells iMacs). Add to this OS/X being a consumer-oriented OS with no enterprise features to speak off, lack of roadmap, unserviceable designs and it's clear that any increase in iMac sales is a result of iOS halo effect that won't last.

 

[miles01110]

This has been a news item for the past 10 years. I guess any deviation - no matter how small - from the norm is newsworthy. Like Macs in the enterprise.

 

[rnizlek]

who said that windows is best for corporate use? Hah, and if they switched it means that they tried windows but switched to mac

I definitely don't feel that "windows is best for corporate use," however, Apple's enterprise management tools are really lacking on the server side. While I've been a Mac guy for years, Windows server beats Mac OS server hands down, having worked with both (for medium to large businesses, that is - on the small business side, Apple has some pretty good solutions). I hope that over the long run Apple starts to reinvest in the back-end of things, because I think they'd be able to do a lot of really innovative stuff. But even if they don't, that doesn't mean that Macs don't have a place on employees' desks.

One feature I would LOVE to see in Mac OS X, though, is some form of Remote Desktop Connection Protocol. Apple Remote Desktop just doesn't cut it for remote access - it's laggy and a bandwidth hog, being based on VNC. Connecting to Windows PCs remotely is a breeze and a very pleasurable experience, whereas doing remote connections to Macs is really frustrating. This is really one "must have" feature for business use going forward, at least where I work.

 

[Rudy69]

I really wish my work would let me do my work on a mac

Everything I do can be done easily on OSX (Eclipse etc are all available)

 

[notjustjay]

Why would any corporation choose to use iMacs? Apple does not offer corporate friendly desktop designs. More importantly, corporate hate to be dependent on a single supplier (and as far as I know nobody but Apple sells iMacs). Add to this OS/X being a consumer-oriented OS with no enterprise features to speak off, lack of roadmap, unserviceable designs and it's clear that any increase in iMac sales is a result of iOS halo effect that won't last.

Hey, I have an idea. What if Apple made servers...

 

[samcraig]

Even more so now that we are in the "post pc era." Mac+iOS play better

No one (today) is living in a post PC era. That's marketing speak and is convoluted at best.

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

And what are the projections on how much maintaining computers will cost this year vs. last?

 

[rnizlek]

Why would any corporation choose to use iMacs? Apple does not offer corporate friendly desktop designs. More importantly, corporate hate to be dependent on a single supplier (and as far as I know nobody but Apple sells iMacs). Add to this OS/X being a consumer-oriented OS with no enterprise features to speak off, lack of roadmap, unserviceable designs and it's clear that any increase in iMac sales is a result of iOS halo effect that won't last.

How is the Mac Mini not a "corporate friendly desktop design?" Everyone who walks into my office at work (which is probably 95% Windows and 5% Macs) loves my Mac Mini and wants one - purely for the space they save on desks. As an IT administrator, I've found Mac Minis ideal for deployment in a business environment.

And giving employees the choice to use Mac isn't "being dependent on a single supplier" as many employees will also choose to use PCs. Becoming an all-Mac shop presents issues, but that's not what any of these companies are doing, nor should they. In my opinion, the best computer for business use is the one that an employee feels they are most productive using.

As per my above post, though, I do agree that some business oriented features are sorely lacking from Mac OS.

 

[Eidorian]

Why would any corporation choose to use iMacs? Apple does not offer corporate friendly desktop designs. More importantly, corporate hate to be dependent on a single supplier (and as far as I know nobody but Apple sells iMacs). Add to this OS/X being a consumer-oriented OS with no enterprise features to speak off, lack of roadmap, unserviceable designs and it's clear that any increase in iMac sales is a result of iOS halo effect that won't last.

We never touched the iMacs in our department. Even a lowly secretary would get a Power Mac just so we would be able to open it down the road for service and other upgrades. Later on we moved to the Intel based Mac minis from the old Power Macs.

On the Windows side we would order the SFF Optiplexs. Those things just will not die.

 

[greenmeanie]

And the reason is because the people would rather have the companies/Schools pay the high price tag.
At least where I work that is the case.

[url=http://cdn.macrumors.com/im/macrumorsthreadlogodarkd.png]Image[/url]


Image

In the past 5 years, Apple's push into the enterprise has been led by the iPhone and the iPad. Corporate IT departments, long dominated by the BlackBerry, are becoming more receptive to iOS products, especially when users are given the choice about which platform to use.

In addition to iOS driving up Apple's sales -- accounting for some two-thirds of Apple's revenue in fact -- iOS's corporate success is driving enterprise adoption of the Mac. The Wall Street Journal writes of Apple's growing success in getting the Mac onto the desks of corporate employees. GE has more than 1,000 Mac users under a year-long pilot project that allows employees to choose to use Macs instead of PC's, without any significant knowledge of the program inside GE. The company has 330,000 computers, the vast majority running Windows.
Forrester Research estimates that Apple will sell $9 billion in Macs and $10 billion in iPads to corporations this year, up 50% from 2011. Forrester anticipates spending on PCs and tablets made by other companies will decline by 3% to $69 billion.

Article Link: Macs Landing on Corporate Desks, Led by iPhones and iPads

 

[Wicked1]

who said that windows is best for corporate use? Hah, and if they switched it means that they tried windows but switched to mac

Yep especially when you get a fast Laptop and by the time is loaded down with Security Software and AV software and all the other Bloatware crud, my fast machine which is a new Dell is so much slower then my 3 year old uMB.

We went from using Macs to certain people, then all windows, but everyone in my company all have iPads, Macs and everyone is dropping Android and BB phones and have purchased iPhones, in fact all I see is iPhones, with the exception of a handful of folks who still have flip phones.

 

[CmdrLaForge]

I have a corporate MBP for 2 years now. I work for a very large Fortune 100 company.

 

[the8thark]

Even more so now that we are in the "post pc era." Mac+iOS play better

Macs and iPacs are PCs. So that "Post PC era" statement is really a lie. It's more "redefining what most people think is the average PC era"

 

[george-brooks]

As a college student, one of my biggest fears is entering the PC dominated corporate world. I want to be able to use a mac at work!! I hope this becomes the norm over the next few years.

 

[the8thark]

Hey, I have an idea. What if Apple made servers...

They did. Xserve. And nobody bought them. So Apple discontinued them.

 

[steve2112]

Why would any corporation choose to use iMacs? Apple does not offer corporate friendly desktop designs. More importantly, corporate hate to be dependent on a single supplier (and as far as I know nobody but Apple sells iMacs). Add to this OS/X being a consumer-oriented OS with no enterprise features to speak off, lack of roadmap, unserviceable designs and it's clear that any increase in iMac sales is a result of iOS halo effect that won't last.

This is right on the money. I find it amusing that as more enterprises decide to start adopting Macs, Apple has turned away from the enterprise market. We have a decent size enterprise, and have all the problems you listed. We tried to become our own service center, but it was too much of a pain in the neck. The closest Apple store is about an hour away, so that isn't really an option. We use a third party solution to for enterprise management, and it works well. Too bad it has to run on Snow Leopard server, and is running on our XServe. We still haven't found a viable replacement, since Apple decided to kill both of those.

The worst part is the people making all the decisions see the iOS devices and shiny things like the Air and think they are cool. Then they come to the technical people and tell us to make it work with our existing infrastructure, but they have no idea how difficult it is.

 

[ouimetnick]

My mom works at GE Aviation in Lynn. They as you might imagine are wicked strict about cameras. Like the article says, iPhones are now allowed.. even at the Aviation plants. Just can't take a picture.. or you will be prosecuted. My mom is considering an iPhone.. her ****** BlackBerry's trackball is getting all gunked up and not working well.

 

[ericinboston]

if my employer offered to buy me a $2000 MBP compared to a cheapo $500 laptop i'd be all over it as well. mostly for bragging rights

when BB's first came out it was the same way, everyone wanted one and it was a status thing. same with laptops. now it's apple stuff

Corporations don't give out $500 laptops (presuming you mean Wintel laptops).

Yes, companies may get a crazy discount if they buy 10,000 laptops...but they still are not $500.

The average priced Wintel laptop is probably about $800 after discount. And of course there are A LOT of factors that could contradict my statement...brand, volume, employee need (developer vs. CEO vs. customer service vs. admin).

In fact, I don't know a single person that's ever bought a $500 laptop...they are pretty much worthless and intended for extremely light usage. Average Wintel laptops purchased by consumers are probably $650-$900 these days.

 

[macomrade]

Why would any corporation choose to use iMacs? Apple does not offer corporate friendly desktop designs. More importantly, corporate hate to be dependent on a single supplier (and as far as I know nobody but Apple sells iMacs). Add to this OS/X being a consumer-oriented OS with no enterprise features to speak off, lack of roadmap, unserviceable designs and it's clear that any increase in iMac sales is a result of iOS halo effect that won't last.

Yes, why would any corporation want to harness a reliable, scalable, and secure UNIX-based solution in the workplace?

X is every bit as proprietary as Windows; I just don't see how that makes it inferior when it comes to enterprise. Clearly Microsoft's robust 6 year roadmap plan/serviceable design for Vista was a riot of a success. Apple released how many milestone versions of X in that same period? Right.

Oh, and it's not OS/X, it's OS X thank you very much.

 

[Consultant]

Well, this has been happening in the past few years. But it's good to see more IT openness.