Apple discovers gravity, again

Reality distortion field

For Apple there’s no escaping the fact all of its blockbuster products were developed, or at least conceived, under the watchful eye of its late co-founder Steve Jobs, whose famed “reality distortion field” was frequently deployed to push staff to their limits in finessing products to their maximum potential.

Yet since his death in 2011, there have understandably been doubts expressed about Apple’s ability to maintain product momentum.

“I think they’re going to struggle to come up with something new,” says Phil Harpur, senior ICT research manager, Frost and Sullivan A/NZ.

Gartner’s Baker disagrees that the situation is quite so dire.

“It’s a little too early to declare invention has gone out of Apple, but I do think the market is nervous about that.”

He maintains however that people “ascribed more credit to Jobs than he deserved”.

“Can Apple continue to be creative?” he asks. “They’ve certainly got the talent.”

But aside from the issue of limited product lines, Apple also suffers from an altogether narrow technology focus compared to its key enterprise rivals. Gartner’s Nexus of Forces for the enterprise highlights four major enterprise technology themes as: mobility, cloud, social and information. While Apple is active in the first two it has virtually no solutions addressing either social or information.

And the lack of a technology roadmap means enterprises have good cause to be nervous about investing heavily in Apple, especially given other tech giants typically provide product roadmaps looking ahead one or several years as a matter of course. 

It’s something Apple did routinely in the decade that Jobs was away from Apple, but the practice died off after he returned in 1997 and set the company on course to be the consumer juggernaut it is today.  

“Apple is still way too secretive about what it does in the enterprise,” Baker says.

But signs are that change is afoot.

“There is evidence Apple is paying more attention to the enterprise,” Baker adds, stressing that CEO Tim Cook has on several occasions indicated that his eyes are well and truly on the ball.

Mature security

A key example is the greater focus on iOS security, with Gartner reporting the platform now has “increasingly mature security and manageability functions”. Like any other platform, security threats still exist (see ‘Top 5 iOS security threats’ p32), but Apple appears to be more vigilant in addressing them.

In addition, Apple has tried to make it easier for customers to access its APIs, helping to simplify systems and device management for IT managers.

Even more significantly, Baker says in recent months Apple has begun advertising for internal sales staff  addressing the business market.

“That’s not something we’ve ever seen before.”

ICT’s Phil Harpur concedes there are great opportunities for Apple to gain a foothold in the enterprise, but questions whether it really has the commitment. 

“It seems pretty obvious there’s much more opportunity for Apple in the enterprise sector which they haven’t tapped into yet. But they seem content to take a backseat to the whole idea.”

However, fellow Frost analyst Anand Balasubramanian notes that several large integrators, including UXC Connect and Fujitsu, are already working closely with Apple on enterprise accounts in Australia.

“These companies have definitely capitalised on opportunities for Apple,” he says.

But he agrees Apple has more work to do.

“It’s like they’re concentrating more on the devices, which seems to be a more passive role compared with Microsoft and RIM which seem to have a planned roadmap.”

Lenovo’s declaration late last month that RIM was on its list of potential acquisition targets might also worry Apple, given the Chinese company’s rapid growth, drive and resources to innovate combined with RIM’s coveted product and patent portfolio around business mobility.

Harpur notes another challenge facing Apple in the enterprise; security and manageability issues stemming from the fact its apps can only be downloaded via individuals’ iTunes accounts.

“There’s no comprehensive security measure [with iTunes].”

He adds that Apple also needs to address security and manageability issues stemming from the fact its apps can only be downloaded via individuals’ iTunes accounts.

“There’s no comprehensive security measure [with iTunes].”

Gartner notes Apple is more responsive to businesses in certain geographies, citing Australia as one example. What remains to be seen is whether Apple’s consumer-oriented approach achieves acceptance among enterprise customers.

Given the unrivalled “halo effect” enjoyed by Apple products which have now achieved deep and irreversible penetration within the business world, it would seem they have no choice. If that’s the case, the entire IT industry may be about to experience a complete paradigm shift in the way all major vendors deal with larger corporate customers.

A recent Gartner report titled Working with Apple requires a different approach to vendor management made the following observations:

“Apple is not likely to significantly change how it deals with enterprises anytime soon, putting the burden of change on IT.

“Other vendors may change their processes to be more like Apple’s, forcing enterprises to change vendor management strategies.”

That all depends of course on whether Apple’s rivals are able to develop the sorts of compelling, must-have products that made the Cupertino giant the most successful consumer technology company ever, while catapulting it over the high wall into the enterprise.

The signs are that they are. The immediate question is whether Apple can keep up with itself.

Apple declined the offer to comment for this article.