Wireless Device Management: Controlling the Wireless Enterprise and Reducing Total Cost of Ownership

Today's Wireless Environment
The technology platform of today's enterprise has a rapidly growing component: wireless systems. From field operations, to logistics and supply chain, a host of crucial business activities and applications are now conducted, even driven, by wireless mobile devices.

Wireless technology makes today's global supply chain enterprise more flexible and better able to respond to changing markets and aggressive competition. In the past decade, these devices and their applications have transformed supply chain management - making it leaner, more productive and more in tune with customer preferences and expectations.

However, the fundamental value of wireless devices - their mobility, which translates into ease of use and efficiency - is also their greatest challenge from an IT management perspective. Many businesses now recognize that comprehensive management of their wireless device infrastructure is a crucial component of a total IT enterprise management solution.

The Challenge of Mobility
A mobile device is not locked down - it's an enterprise asset that is potentially always on the move. It contains valuable software and firmware that needs to be configured, tracked and managed as your business grows, in lockstep with the other components of your enterprise IT environment.

As an active digital device, it is a point of entry, and thus a point of vulnerability for the wireless-enabled enterprise. In this Web-based digital age, network security remains a paramount concern.

Recently, a major US auto manufacturer had their global network compromised via a wireless link into one of their facilities located in Europe. Additionally, a major US electronics chain learned that people in their parking lot were plucking customer's credit card information from their wireless network. These types of breaches, sniffing and network hi-jacking have raised the overall awareness around Wireless Security and caused the initiation of several wireless compliance-based standards.

And, given today's business environment, enterprise mergers and acquisitions are a constant fact of business life. Potentially, that means managing and migrating multiple wireless platforms, with potential legacy technologies and protocols.