RIM cuddles up to iPhone, iPad IT admins, announces BlackBerry Mobile Fusion
RIM today announced BlackBerry Mobile Fusion, something they're touting as "The Next Generation Enterprise Mobility Solution for BlackBerry, Android and iOS Smartphones and Tablets". Really. Says so right here:
We are pleased to introduce BlackBerry Mobile Fusion - RIM's next generation enterprise mobility solution - to make it easier for our business and government customers to manage the diversity of devices in their operations today," said Alan Panezic, Vice President, Enterprise Product Management and Marketing at Research In Motion. "BlackBerry Mobile Fusion brings together our industry-leading BlackBerry Enterprise Server technology for BlackBerry devices with mobile device management capabilities for iOS and Android devices, all managed from one web-based console. It provides the necessary management capabilities to allow IT departments to confidently oversee the use of both company-owned and employee-owned mobile devices within their organizations.
While RIM is still struggling to get PlayBook to 2.0 and BBX superphones into the hungry hands of the CrackBerry Nation, this could be an interesting way to hedge against Enterprise BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) trends that skew users away from traditional BlackBerry's and towards iPhones.
Still, consumers would probably still prefer BBM for iOS...
Source: CrackBerry.com
Editor-in-Chief of iMore, Executive Producer at Mobile Nations, co-host of Iterate and ZEN and TECH, cook, grappler, photon wrangler.
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Booooooo!!!!!!!!
No one's going to pay them to use this crap because those provisioning other smartphones within the enterprise are already using provisioning software to do that much easier than whatever RIM would put out. RIM just needs to go away...
"much easier"
I guess by making this statement you must have tried using it?
I'd rather use smoke signals than anything from RIM.
Somebody needs to take better care of their iPhone! It looks battered and abused.
Actually that looks like an invisishield...
May I just say everyone who thinks this is a bad idea or "RIM should just go away" is just plain dumb!
To summarize: 1. RIM's Blackberry Enterprise Server(BES) is the most secure system in the world for mobile communications (that's why the president is allowed to have a cell phone, when no other president in the past was)
RIM is offering a new system that lets iPhone and android users have the same security as a Blackberry.
People commenting on this post think this is bad... Does not compute!
Why are you all against such an idea of having both the security of RIM and the best phone on the market (iPhone) combined as an enterprise solution for non-blackberry users!
I am the IT at a law firm where only about 4 of the 40 lawyers do NOT own blackberrys. The ONLY reason is because of the security of the blackberry servers. The firm does not think the alternative SSL certifications used for mobile email is secure enough, and for good reason!
Securing communications is not the only thing BES does, it gives the admins complete control of the phone from DNS blocking to remote security wipe and beyond! No system is better and as for implementing it I'm sure all you need to do is install this alongside the current BES system.
This is a smart move on RIM's part, they never made good phones, but because of the communication security corporations and government offices love them. Plus this opens up the possibility of having legitimate cross platform BBM!
Honestly how do so many people think this is a bad thing!
You're shocked that iPhone owners don't understand technology? Isn't that the exact person the iPhone is built for?
It's almost 2012.
http://www.iphonejd.com/iphone_jd/2011/11/virtually-all-of-the-most-profitable-law-firms-use-iphones.html
4 out of 40 means nothing really. If letting other phones be used in some of the biggest law firms in the nation is ok, then its ok for 40 or 4 lawyer firms.
This is just the old way of thinking that BES is the only thing that can properly manage devices. Activesync protocol has made leaps and bounds in the past few years and is plenty good for security, remote wipes, etc.
The reason people in firms or corporations are moving away from Blackberry is that is not the phone they want to use full time, and for a good reason. The OS is old, the hardware is old, and development is barely there for apps.
There is more to the world and more important things to business utility than Department of Defense level security.
You're an idiot admin then. I have the same level of control over iOS devices as I have over other smartphones like BB. With 3rd party control tools you can have almost as much control from application install pushes or limits to other restrictions. RIM's BES platform is old and antiquated and RIM's dragging their asses for the past 3 years has bit them in the ass big time. This new idea (if you even want to call it that because they played around with this idea a couple of years ago) won't do shit for their image.
Also, Obama doesn't use a BB for government communications. If you knew anything, you'd know that. You're living in a dream world where you've been sold on the idea of security is all your communication going through another country's network simply because their NOC is in that country. Ya, cuz that makes me feel real secure. I got an idea... let's move RIM's NOC to China and see how many people trust that NOC enough to run a BB handset and BES server in their company.
Thanks for summarizing it right there. I guess in the eyes of some self-proclaimed non-idiot admins, "3rd party tools that give you almost as much" is a much trusted solution than what RIM has to offer.
If you knew anything, you'd know when the data is encrypted with your own keys, it doesn't matter where the NOC is - and honestly I'd trust a NOC in Canada more than a NOC with Uncle Sam.
No one from my day job is installing or controlling anything on my iPhone, so this wouldn't help me, but control freak IT Departments that love Blackberry's and hate that co-workers are using iPhones will love this, if the workers allow them access and control of their personal phones. I don't know of any company buying iPhones for their staff, but surely someone out there has considered it.
Doesn't do anything Afaria hasn't been doing for more than a year.
BREAKING : Upcoming iPhone 5 , iPad 3 and Apple TV revealed : http://j.mp/rHL0eO
Who is RIM? What's a Blackberry?
problem is I can jailbreak an iOS device and have full control over it, and there's nothing IT admins can do about it.