Between the Lines

Larry Dignan, Andrew Nusca and Rachel King

iPad driving massive growth for iOS in enterprise (survey)

By | October 20, 2011, 6:00am PDT

Summary: Despite speculation that iPad 2 sales have been a letdown for Apple, the device is driving growth for iOS in general in the enterprise world.

Although the iPad is a runaway success in the tablet market — the point where critics and executives have just acknowledged it simply “an iPad market”Apple’s tablet has made considerable headway in the enterprise world as well.

Thanks to the iPad, iOS in general has grown in popularity and use among enterprise customers, which can be seen in the graph below according to a new survey from Good Technology, a company dedicated to a push e-mail and device management along with security products for mobile phones. Good’s enterprise mobile clientele includes 49 of the Fortune 100.

Here are some of the highlights from the report covering activations in enterprise during the third quarter of 2011:

  • iOS tablets represent over 96 percent of total tablet activations
  • Android tablets increased slightly to 4 percent of overall tablet activations for the quarter
  • iOS devices (iPhone, iPad and iPod touch), accounted for over 70 percent of activations
  • Android smartphones represented nearly 39 percent of all smartphone activations, whereas the iPhone nabbed 61 percent
  • Among the top 10 industry verticals, financial services continued to see the highest level of iPad activation, accounting for 46 percent for the quarter—more than tripling the amount of activation in any other industry

The findings are overwhelmingly more obvious when demonstrated in this graph below:

Yet somehow, despite all of this, iPad 2 sales have still been construed as somewhat disappointing. The bar is definitely high for the iPad 3 and any other device that means to challenge it.

Android continues to gain market share overall — which is indisputable based on Android’s continued dominance of the mobile platform market, at least in the United States, for the last several months. Nevertheless, Good concludes that enterprise end users are showing clear preference for Apple products these days.

However, these numbers very well could change drastically within the next year. On the one hand, the iPhone 4S is already doing well for itself, despite a mixed welcome when it was unveiled earlier this month. Yet, there are plenty more Android handsets on the way — and likely (or hopefully) much better ones with the launch of Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich), starting with the newly-revealed Samsung Galaxy Nexus.

[Charts via Good Technology]

Related:

Kick off your day with ZDNet's daily e-mail newsletter. It's the freshest tech news and opinion, served hot. Get it.

Topics

Rachel King is a staff writer for ZDNet based in San Francisco.

Disclosure

Rachel King

Rachel King has no business relationships, affiliations, investments, or other potential conflicts of interest relating to the content posted in this blog.

Biography

Rachel King

Rachel King is a staff writer for CBS Interactive in San Francisco. Before serving as a contributing editor at ZDNet in New York City for two years, she previously worked for The Business Insider, FastCompany.com, CNN's San Francisco bureau and the U.S. Department of State. Rachel has also written for MainStreet.com, Irish America Magazine and the New York Daily News, among others. Rachel has a B.A. in Mass Communications and History from the University of California, Berkeley and a M.S. in Journalism from Columbia University, where she served as art director for the student magazine, Plated.

Talkback Most Recent of 18 Talkback(s)

  • RE: iPad driving massive growth for iOS in enterprise (survey)
    Or maybe Good Technology fudged the numbers. Are these tablets really being used in the enterprise or is some CEO just bringing it to work every day? I'm guessing the latter. We keep hearing stories about how tablets are in the enterprise then show no proof of such things. I think Good Technology is just going on hearsay.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    LoverockDavidson_-24231404894599612871915491754222
    20th Oct
  • Where there's smoke there's fire as they say:)
    @LoverockDavidson_ ... Don't get too close Lovey you might get burned! OUCH!

    Pagan jim
    ZDNet Gravatar
    James Quinn
    20th Oct
  • Talk about fudging numbers
    In the Fortune 500, there are only 500 CEOs. They can't possibly account for the numbers observed. You'll have to do better than "the CEOs are bringing them from home" if you want us to believe your Microsoft PR.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Robert Hahn
    20th Oct
  • That's not the question
    @LoverockDavidson_

    Since we're talking statistics here, the percentage of activations for iOS devices looks impressive... but it just shows the *percentages*.

    Unless we know how many tablets were activated for enterprise purposes, the percentages are *meaningless*. Think that's crazy? Let's say that during each month, only 1,000 tablets were activated by users for enterprise purposes. The iOS devices could have activated 960 devices per month...thereby meeting the "96%" criteria claimed in the survey. Yet 4,000 tablets (1,000 per month), is not a significant number of tablets, given that there have been *millions* sold this year (as they would represent less than 0.1% of the total sales).

    Nor is a figure given for the number of tablets & mobile devices sold to enterprise customers, versus the number of non-mobile devices (i.e. traditional PC sales) made during the same periods.

    Again, statistics are just statistics, & don't necessarily represent reality...
    ZDNet Gravatar
    spdragoo@...
    20th Oct
  • RE: iPad driving massive growth for iOS in enterprise (survey)
    @LoverockDavidson_
    It's more than CEOs, but you're definately onto something. iPads are a consumption device. They work well to show and display data. Top level employees who aren't creating data can use them to look at data others have created and perhaps use them as display data. But that is where iPad stops, as you can't use them as an every day device, creating documents or spreadsheets or even too many emails. Also they are limits with IT as you can't secure them or do simple things like add them to active directory.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    stevesu*
    20th Oct
  • RE: iPad driving massive growth for iOS in enterprise (survey)
    @stevesu* Um, why do you say you can't you make documents? I do with my Ipad everyday. It would seem as if you're just making things up instead of basing replies on facts..???
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Rapid Rec
    20th Oct
  • RE: iPad driving massive growth for iOS in enterprise (survey)
    @stevesu* And why do you say you can't create spreadsheets? I do that daily as well.

    You guys really ought to look at an iPad before you criticize it.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    StandardPerson
    23rd Oct
  • RE: iPad driving massive growth for iOS in enterprise (survey)
    @LoverockDavidson_ Did you hear about the airlines? using them in the planes?
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Hasam1991
    20th Oct
  • Those in the airlines are being used as "simple" reading devices,
    and not as productivity devices.

    Nothing wrong with that. But, let's face it, the iPad is being used for what it's best at, and that's as a simple media consumption device, and in the case of the airlines, as a replacement for the flight manuals.

    The enterprise level usage is not as simple, unless an executive just wants to carry around lists of anything relating to what the corporation is engaged in, like a list of customers or consumers, or a ready-made report, such as a spreadsheet.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    adornoe@...
    20th Oct
  • Great statistic
    "iOS tablets represent over 96 percent of total tablet activations"

    It is a sick market. We all lose.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    toddybottom
    20th Oct
  • Imagine there's no iPad
    96% of tablet buyers think they've won. It's their money, so you don't get to tell them what to think. If there were no iPad, no one would be buying tablets at all.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Robert Hahn
    20th Oct
  • If there were no Windows
    no one would be buying computers at all.

    It's their money so no one gets to tell them what to think.

    Agree? Disagree?
    ZDNet Gravatar
    toddybottom
    20th Oct
  • toddybottom/Robert Hahn: Both of you are correct, but...
    if there were no technology, there would be no computers, and people wouldn't be spending their money on any of it. And, they wouldn't know the difference and wouldn't miss it.

    Agree? Disagree?
    ZDNet Gravatar
    adornoe@...
    20th Oct
  • ZDNet Gravatar
    dyityibg
    20th Oct
  • RE: iPad driving massive growth for iOS in enterprise (survey)
    @dyityibg

    Don't bother, it's a link to a shopping site.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    bargeemike
    20th Oct

Talkback - Tell Us What You Think

Formatting +
BB Codes - Note: HTML is not supported in forums
  • [b] Bold [/b]
  • [i] Italic [/i]
  • [u] Underline [/u]
  • [s] Strikethrough [/s]
  • [q] "Quote" [/q]
  • [ol][*] 1. Ordered List [/ol]
  • [ul][*] · Unordered List [/ul]
  • [pre] Preformat [/pre]
  • [quote] "Blockquote" [/quote]

The best of ZDNet, delivered

ZDNet Newsletters

Get the best of ZDNet delivered straight to your inbox

Facebook Activity

White Papers, Webcasts, & Resources