The speed of change - Industry Trend or Event

Communications News, Dec, 2000 by Ken Anderberg

One day in the not-too-distant future, we all will be handed a laptop computer, a cell phone and a personal digital assistant (PDA) on the first day of starting a new job. For a few companies today, that is the norm. For most companies in the future, that will be a standard practice.

Mobile computing, and the wireless technologies that will enhance our ability to work away from the office, will be pervasive forces in the enterprise environment over the next few years. The implications for the enterprise are huge, both in terms of managing this new network and in its business-generating capabilities.

At the recent Gartner IT/xpo in Orlando, FL, more than a thousand IT people showed their interest in the subject, jamming a seminar hall's seats, floor space and standing room to hear Nick Jones of Gartner discuss "The Mobile E-business Scenario." His message: Get on the mobile bandwagon now, as the speed of change will be revolutionary, not evolutionary.

Within three years, Jones predicts, there will be more than a billion mobile phones in the world, many of them data-enabled. New types of applications--such as the ability to turn on the washing machine back home--will be made possible by declining prices of such items as mobile phone chip sets. Nearly every "economically active consumer" in the world, he says, will own a mobile phone, opening new Internet-based opportunities for businesses.

Another forecast by Jones: "By 2005, all mobile devices will contain at least one form of integrated, wireless connectivity." That means your PDA will talk to your laptop or PC via Bluetooth technology, and your mobile phone will share data with your PDA, laptop, PC and almost everyone else's similar devices.

So, what does all this have to do with each of us receiving a laptop, cell phone and PDA upon employment--besides the obvious telecommuting reasons? Two words: security and interoperability.

Currently, you may have your own personal laptop that you take with you on business trips, or use to work from home. If you have one, your PDA is most likely a personal purchase. Your cell phone also is often a personal purchase. Imagine a company with hundreds of employees using remote technology that they purchased themselves, and visualize the wide variety of vendors associated with those devices. The networking and security issues resulting from this hodgepodge of technologies is, to say the least, daunting for IT managers.

Vendors and enterprises both are struggling with this dilemma. The former must implement ways for various devices, from various vendors, to "talk" with each other. The latter must determine whether providing employees with the same type of PDA, cell phone and laptop is more cost-effective than trying to network a disparate group of such devices.

Both must assess the security concerns inherent in wireless transmissions. Securing the airwaves of all these potential applications will be a daunting, yet absolutely necessary task. As Jones told the Gartner audience, "Wireless architectures include all the vulnerabilities of Internet architectures and introduce several new risks ... (and) offer new points of attack for hacking."

Solving the security and interoperability challenges will be easier for enterprises that adopt compatible technologies and provide those technologies to their employees. The solution, however, will not come cheaply.

Forrester Research says firms will be spending 55% more for security in 2002 than they do now--from an average of $2.9 million now to $4.5 million in two years. The mobile e-business scenario outlined by Jones will have a great deal to do with that increase.

To offer your viewpoint on this subject, e-mail: kena@comnews.com