1 March 2012, Sydney, Australia - A new research report from IDC ANZ confirms that while 'mobility' will be a cornerstone of the future workspace, it should not be considered in isolation and will need to evolve to encompass more of the broader workspace. As a result, enterprises will need to continue to support other components such as printing, desk-based computing and peripherals. It will therefore be mandatory for service providers and vendors to identify organisations by types to determine the extent in which mobility should be integrated into their business.

The research also finds that organisations with over 500 employees are more likely to deploy an enterprise mobility strategy in the near term and suggests it is not a top high priority yet for SMBs. Considering ANZ is an SMB-heavy market, IDC ANZ expects fierce competition in the top end of the market especially as desk-based computing becomes more commoditised.

"There are many trends driving mobility in the workspace such as consumerisation of IT, cloud deployment models, collaboration and social networks," says Dustin Kehoe, Associate Research Director, IDC Australia." The point is the technology should only move as fast as the other pieces for enterprises to deploy a successful next generation workspace strategy."

The report warns that vendors should not make the mistake of selling point solutions, but rather embrace partnerships to deliver an end to end solution. It also advises vendors and IT decision markers to canvass lines of business and develop more robust TCO/ROI metrics to quantify success.

The report which is entitled Testing Enterprise Mobility Assumptions in Australia and New Zealand by Organisation Size draws on two primary sources. The first is the ANZ Next Generation Workspace Ecosystem CIO and IT Decision Maker Survey which had a sample size of 291 participants and the second is the ANZ Enterprise Employee Survey. This survey investigated the perceptions, usage and expectations of 600 employees across the region.

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