The mobile enterprise is one of those phrases which has been around for so long that it’s easy to assume it is ‘real’. In fact, for many corporations it still just means smoother access to company data for workers on the road, and a dose of centralized device management and security. Creating applications specifically to underpin a fully mobile set of processes and customer/supplier interactions is in its infancy, and most of the major enterprise software companies are only just getting serious about platforms which are optimized for mobile use. Now they face the double challenge of accelerating their efforts to ensure their offerings do not lag behind the requirements of their customers, and adapting their software once again for the internet of things (IoT).
Until recently, mobile enterprise app development was largely the preserve of specialist firms like Appcelerator, but now Oracle, IBM, Salesforce/com, SAP and others are belatedly releasing sophisticated mobile platforms of their own. At the recent Oracle OpenWorld conference, the new Mobile Application Framework (MAF) was a highlight, though it was called “the most un-Oracle product we’ve ever delivered” by one employee who spoke to GigaOM.
Oracle also previewed its Mobile Application Accelerator (MAX), which helps semi-technical business users to create apps without writing any logic. This is an important big-name endorsement for the no-coding trend, long established in enterprise software but fairly immature in mobile despite a sizeable group of specialist providers such as Catavolt and Webalo.
The main problem with mobile software – whether tools for inhouse use or ‘software as a service’ cloud offerings – is that standards are immature and politically charged, and the IoT is looming before these issues have been fully addressed even for smartphones.
Salesforce.com aims to be more proactive in the IoT and mobile these days, with the launch of Lightning, the successor to its current Salesforce1 apps platform. Unveiled at its Dreamforce conference in San Francisco last week, Mike Rosenbaum, EVP of platforms, said Lightning was geared not just to fast development but rapid iteration of apps. Its Lightning App Builder allows users to assemble apps from pre-built Salesforce.com or third party components, with templates and a drag-and-drop interface to help.
Since this is HTML5-based, the resulting software can run on all device types and the company itself is already using Lightning to run the Salesforce1 mobile app, announced last year.
Lightning software runs on top of Salesforce.com’s workflow engine, tapping into analytics , dashboards and business processes and providing a single platform for heavy duty professional programmers and business developers.
Al Hilwa, an analyst at IDC, commented: “Model-driven app development is hot now as enterprises embrace mobile-first application development approaches.” Creating a touch of nostalgia for the 1990s, he harked back to the RAD (rapid application development) trend of those days, saying “the basic ideas of RAD are coming back in new form and are now being harnessed in mobile development.”
While HTML5 apps can theoretically run on any device or embedded gadget with a browser, many ‘things’ will not have that capability, so enterprise software platforms will need to start to accommodate these objects too. Salesforce.com is moving in this direction via a collaboration with one of its platinum partners, cloud software consultancy Kerensen, and Sigfox, the French company which is working with partners to create dedicated IoT wireless networks in many countries.
The aim of the partnership is to make it simpler and quicker for Salesforce1 and Lightning users to add new services around IoT devices. The consultancy said it expected to create a large catalog of IoT apps, by making it easy for Salesforce developers to connect their software to the emerging networks of connected objects of all kinds. These apps will then be available from Saleforce.com’s AppExchange.
The solution is based on Sigfox’s two-way IoT connectivity platform, which runs on networks running the UNB (Ultra Narrowband) technology in unlicensed spectrum (868MHz in Europe, 902MHz in the US). These are being built by Sigfox itself in France and partners in other markets (for instance, Arqiva in the UK). This network is linked to Salesforce1 apps via Kerensen’s ‘smart connector’, which allows users to manage data which is sent or received by the connected objects , using any computer or mobile device.
Sigfox tself is reported to be looking for additional funding, aiming to raise at least €50m to extend its reach, according to UK’s Financial Times. With this extra financing, Sigfox believes it can extend its dedicated IoT network – which it has taken to calling ‘0G’ – to half the world within 2-3 years. It already has presence in much of Europe, plus a trial network in San Francisco, and its largest deal to date is with security group Securitas for a national network in Spain to connect home alarms. The FT says Sigfox raised $20.6m in March to fund network development.
In the UK, its partner Arqiva says the first phase of its Sigfox-based IoT platform will launch next month and 10 cities will be covered by April, with national roll-out after that. Simon Trist, Arqiva’s product and propositions director, told Total Telecom’s Carriers World event that this will be a “high volume, low margin” business, unlike its traditional activities in mobile and broadcast infrastructure, but this would be commercially viable because of the “incredibly low cost” of deploying the network. He said that, provided Arqiva had suitable sites or could procure them, it was “almost absurdly easy” to add the UNB equipment, which consists of an antenna and ADSL or 3G connection, with “device cost at least one-tenth of any competing wireless technology”.
Arqiva has been diversifying its traditional business in big-ticket areas like cell towers, into infrastructure services for newer types of networks such as WiFi, small cells and IoT.