I was pleasantly surprised when an electric cart — stocked with fresh vegetables — rolled out in front of my house. The vegetables looked fresh, so I picked a few. “How much?” I asked. He pulled out a Lenovo tablet, launched an app, put in the items and respective weights, and printed a bill from a tiny Bluetooth-connected printer. Voila! he said, ‘Rs 56’.
In the evening, my online grocery supplier brought a few items I had ordered. As I opened my wallet, I realised, I had run out of cash. “I’ll just run to the ATM and grab some cash,” I told him. It’ll just be a minute. “Well, you can swipe your card here,” he replied. Out came a mobile phone and tiny device that he slid on top. He swiped my card, entered the amount, I signed on the mobile screen using my finger, and done!
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Enterprises are also adopting innovative ways to seamlessly manage work. Corporate emails, presentations, audio conferencing etc. are already accepted implements on mobile devices. However, the concept of desktop computers (in a traditional sense) is gradually being replaced by devices such as thin clients, Chromebooks and BYOD, where devices can connect to a mother ship (central datacenter) and employees can securely and seamlessly complete their respective tasks.
This simplifies management of data and applications for the enterprises, and provides a sense of convenience to employees. However, mobility at enterprises does come with its risks.
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Smartphones, in a way, had started a revolution of sorts by bringing together a telephone and computing features on a mobile device. As mobile devices proliferated, more and more data started being accessed and shared. And, then came the data breaches we had failed to anticipate. Well, everybody but one company. No wonder Obama still likes his trusted BlackBerry!
Things have changed now though. There are a bunch of players such as Citrix, BlackBerry, IBM and others, offering secure mobility solutions for enterprises. And, most of these solutions support devices running different operating systems including iOS, Android and Windows.
So what?
What does all this mean and how does it benefit anyone? Well, for one, you don’t have to run to an ATM every time you need to buy vegetables. Sometime in the future, the government can think of spending less on producing cash, diverting the funds elsewhere.
On the enterprise side, employees can choose to work from anywhere, on any device; the companies don’t lose business in case of a physical site shutdown; and the operations become seamless as well as secure.
There can be a million other opportunities — all — if we tread carefully!
(These are author’s personal views)