"If you can think it, someone's app'ed it. It's all the rage as smartphones and tablets become proliferated and consumers look for personalised always on the go connectivity. But what if we could turn the apps market on its head - and rather than focus on the consumerisation of such tools - use them to drive business efficiencies and change the way we do business," says Nomalanga Nkosi, the general manager for business marketing at MTN Business.
Today's mobile workforce needs 'anytime anywhere' access to corporate intranets, critical data and applications and this is driving the growth of mobile enterprise applications. Approximately 30% of enterprises are using app stores to deploy some of their applications at some level.
Mobile applications and media tablets are placed within the top ten technologies to significantly impact businesses over the next three years. In developed markets, already 65% of workers use a tablet. It is expected that the international trends will soon be a local reality thereby creating an opportunity for local businesses to utilise these devices not only to keep the workforce productive, but also to increase their productivity.
Having started on the consumer side, applications are evolving and fast moving into the enterprise space. However, having generic "enterprise" apps on an app store will not provide businesses with the capabilities and opportunities that complex, tailor-made enterprise apps have to offer.
Through real-time applications that drive business efficiencies and deliver to the market the ability to connect on an innovative platform - specific to the business sector - the uptake of these enterprise applications will continue to increase and that businesses will start seeing the larger benefits and competitive market opportunities that can be derived going forward.
Contact: Bernadine Dawson 082 951 1116
Email: bernadine@orangeink.co.za
