MobileIron Picks Up MDM Customer in Healthcare Industry for BYOD

Mobile device management (MDM) vendor MobileIron hasn’t released any more details on its mysterious video from April, but it has announced a new customer. Tidewell Hospice, a Florida-based not-for-profit hospice, plans to leverage the MobileIron Mobile IT Platform to execute the not-for-profit’s mobility initiatives. Along with the details of the deal, MobileIron also provided MSPmentor with top patient data concerns in the healthcare industry. Here’s the scoop.

Tidewell Hospice provides home-based palliative care to more than 1,000 patients daily throughout the Florida counties of Sarasota, Manatee, Charlotte, and DeSoto. To push its mobility initiatives, the not-for-profit sought a way for social workers and nurses to use their own devices.

Tidewell Hospice CIO David Lafferty said in his prepared remarks that bring your own device (BYOD) reinforced the not-for-profit’s decision to administer a mobile device management (MDM) solution.

“I knew I needed to secure mobile devices and I wanted to provide an added capability for appropriate employees,” he said. “I didn’t want to bring a new physician on board and say you have to use a BlackBerry when they are so accustomed to their iPhone.”

Tidewell said the MobileIron Mobile IT Platform complied with HIPAA requirements.

“Healthcare is one of our largest verticals,” MobileIron Strategy Vice President Ojas Rege told MSPmentor in an email.

According to Rege, the MobileIron security and management platform includes controls for the following key elements of a HIPAA mobile compliance program: ongoing management; remote lock and wipe; encryption; password policy; OS integrity; auto-wipe; email security; application security; file-sharing security; device tracking; quarantine and compliance actions; and logging and audit.

Rege added that there are three main concerns for data: device loss, rogue apps, and well-intentioned, but risky actions (file sharing through public cloud services).

Tidewell made this purchase through MobileIron managed services partner AT&T (T).

“MobileIron is 100 percent channel so all deals are done through partners,” Rege said.

IT research firm Gartner, Inc. (IT) placed MobileIron into the Leaders quadrant in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant report for mobile device management.

MobileIron recently announced an integration with content sharing platform Box. The integration provides employees with a way to securely share content between mobile devices via an encrypted container.