Enterprise Mobility in Africa

Africa has three problems with technology. In no particular order these are lack of capital, a lack of on-ground skills, and a lack of time left to catch up before Brazil and China leave it in the dust. This paralysis is hampering efforts to get enterprises mobile, particularly where infrastructure and cross-border cooperation are less than perfect.

According to a report by Vodafone, African enterprises face an uphill struggle keeping aligned with new technology. This is a tragedy in an environment where mobile is often the only reliable communication medium. CIO’s have little energy to contemplate implementing enterprise-wide communication savings. They have enough to do just staying in touch with an increasingly mobile employee population while trying to ring-fence data.

Vodafone commissioned Circle Research to find out what’s on the minds of Africa’s leading CIO’s across a spread of industries that include manufacturing, finance, retail and utilities. Their growing enterprise mobility worry-beads include:

• Managing increasing communication cost through growth in mobile (56%)
• Addressing employee demands for increased mobile working (26%)
• Tackling the threats associated with insecure networks (56%)
• Dealing with knock-ons associated with lost / stolen phones (49%)

Hardware control is an ongoing challenge, with just 22% knowing how many phones were issued, down to 18% being confident how many were in use. By contrast, 52% were confident of handset repair capability suggesting that the distinction between fixed and mobile was still blurred for some.

Enterprise mobility as a service is rich with possibilities for tackling problems like these head on, especially as it substitutes manageable operational expenditure for high capital outlay. This is particularly useful for enterprises emerging in a bring-your-own-devices culture, and unable to afford the luxury of tailor-made solutions.

Enterprise mobility service providers have the potential to lift this workload and host it on a cloud for African subscribers. Benefits being rolled out include:

• Updated data security
• Rapid implementation and
• Fast response to change
• Scalable to adapt to shifting demand
• Exponentially wider compatibility with devices
• Affordable distribution of development costs
• Seamless bridging to affiliates and partners.

It remains to be seen how many African corporates will take up the opportunities of enterprise mobility in the cloud. The continent is a hotbed of corruption, social disorder and political intrigue – although there are emerging bright spots too. Will African CIO’s hand over their mystique and freedom in exchange for canned solutions? Or will they use the risk of third party infiltration to repel all boarders?

REFERENCES

http://enterprise.vodafone.com/insight_news/2011-04-21-need-for-control-africa-cost-whitepaper.jsp

http://slashdot.org/topic/cloud/is-enterprise-mobility-as-a-service-emaas-right-for-your-company/