Apple iOS 7 has good news for enterprises

Apple’s iOS 7, due for release later this year, will offer many enhancements to interest enterprises, according to a new report from analyst firm Gartner.

According to the report, titled ‘iOS 7 Offers Major Improvements for the Enterprise’ and penned by Gartner analyst Ken Dulaney, “iOS 7 will provide many significant enhancements for enterprise use that were lacking in previous versions.”

Specifically, “The management and security profile of the platform will rise significantly when used in conjunction with a mobile device management (MDM) platform rising to compete with BlackBerry in the enterprise.”

Given that iOS 7 is currently in beta and things may change before final release, it’s somewhat premature to be discussing the benefits it may or may not have - something Gartner acknowledges in its report. However, enterprise IT leaders should spend some time learning about the new OS, the firm says.

With iOS 7, Apple has “prioritised a number of enterprise management needs, added features that expand business usefulness, and corrected a number of incomplete or insufficient concepts launched in earlier versions”, the report says.

In previous versions - up to and including 6.x - the sandboxed architecture of iOS created various limitations for managing devices based on the operating system. As such, enterprise mobile device management vendors “could not deliver what IT organisations wanted, because many of the required features were controlled at a level in the operating system below what they could access”.

But in iOS 7, Apple has provided several upgrades that should remedy these limitations, the firm says. These upgrades include:

• multitasking, “which most sources say is not true multitasking, but a better scheduling algorithm with at least the ability to request more background processing time”;
• single sign on - “Apple will provide an SSO feature using Kerberos-enabled key storage in a shared keychain on the device (keychains are where Apple stores passwords, certificates and other sensitive information in an encrypted format)”;
• common security capabilities, which “can be installed by the application manufacturer, eliminating the need for MDM vendors to have their own technology for software development kits or application wrapping”.

Gartner says that the enhancements in iOS 7 will allow enterprises to “put the platform to productive use in applications from simple wireless email to comprehensive business transactional, collaboration and productivity applications”.

However, the platform is not suitable for the “highest-level security environments” at this time, and “it is unlikely that Apple will pursue such markets in the future”, the firm says. Such high-security environments include cases where complete lockdown is required or where peripheral security products (like common access card readers) are required, the firm says.

Image courtesy of Yutaka Tsutano under CC