Forrester: One-Fifth of Enterprise Employees Use Apple

As Apple continues to grow at lightning speed, its technology is becoming more and more ubiquitous in the enterprise. The latest report from Forrester says Apple now owns a chunk of the enterprise IT pie, with 1 in 5 workers using an Apple device at their job. If you’re thinking mobile device management (MDM) opportunities, you’d be right …

First, a big tip of the hat goes to Josh Lowensohn at CNET, who got his hands on the Forrester survey and dissected its contents. And this survey is much more sizable than Cisco’s own recent tablet survey: Forrester queried almost 10,000 workers and 3,350 IT hardware decision-makers in 17 countries. Of the respondents, 21 percent said they were using at least one Apple product.  And no surprise here, the iPhone was the dominant product.

Why? It’s a reason VARs and IT admins may be very familiar with. High-level executives and managers want their iPhones as part of their workflow. Forrester also found a large link between income and Apple product use, with “those making more than $150,000 being nearly twice as likely to use an Apple product,” than individuals in lower income brackets. Interestingly, more enterprises outside the United States are using Apple, though an actual figure wasn’t provided. What’s more, the survey discovered that 46 percent of companies had issued Macs to their employees.

Because of this, Forrester has made a decisive and divisive statement: This new Apple era could potentially “end [Microsoft] Windows’ dominance in personal tech,” and outlast Google Android because “the wide variety of devices, features, and software support, plus inconsistency of support for OS upgrades, is fragmenting the Android ecosystem.”

Ouch. But regardless of who wins the popularity contest, iOS adoption in the enterprise likely won’t be slowing down anytime soon. VARs who have the unique capabilities to provide management solutions for iOS devices will be at the forefront of this movement. A well-armed VAR also may offer customers an iOS networking and security technology package. “iOS-friendly” could be a badge of differentiation, and as most VARs know, differentiation is key in the marketplace. But even if you’re not an Apple aficionado, some form of MDM know-how to manage Android or Windows 8 tablets will be necessary to compete in the channel.