Making mobile workforce management easier: enterprise apps go on any device

Open Kernel Labs (OK Labs) and Citrix Systems today announced they’ll be creating a service to allow enterprise applications to run on any mobile device. The process, called “mobile-to-enterprise (M2E) virtualization” works by letting a company run its applications on a home server. The service from OK Lands and Citrix will then allow the applications to be emulated on any mobile device connected to the server, even if it has a different operating system.

Citrix will be providing the server-to-mobile delivery infrastructure, with OK Labs bringing the virtualization software. The software will allow any phone that installs it to access the applications being run on the companies home server. The two companies are quite proud of what they call the Bring Your Own Device aspect to this service - the idea that an enterprise with a highly mobile or device-dependent workforce won’t need to provide all of its employees with identical devices. This service will allow the company to simply provide the software to it’s workforce, who will be then be able to access a new “corporate” section on their personal device that contains all of their work applications. 

From the release:

“Citrix has 100 million daily users and the OKL4 microvisor is already deployed in over 300 million devices,” said Steve Subar, President and CEO of OK Labs. “The intersection between OK Labs sizeable deployment in handsets — from Sony Ericsson, HTC, Motorola, Toshiba, LG and others — and the Citrix mobile device technology available — for iPhone, Windows Mobile, RIM and Symbian phones — creates new opportunities across the mobile/internet ecosystem, from MNOs, to handset OEMs, semiconductor suppliers, and enterprise IT.”

“Working together on mobile-to-enterprise virtualization (M2E), Citrix and OK Labs will enable handset OEMs, MNOs, or enterprises to deliver enterprise applications and content to any mobile device through an OK Labs implementation of Citrix Receiver for the OK Labs mobile phone virtualization platform,” said Martin Duursma, Vice President, Citrix Labs. “Today’s announcement broadens the Citrix vision of Project Independence for local desktop virtualization and desktop computing and applies it to enterprise application and desktop delivery into mobile devices.”

“As virtualization reaches out from the server room to make the desktop just another enterprise infrastructure asset, these handheld devices will be next,” said Rachel Chalmers, research analyst at 451 Group. “They’re easily capable of functioning as mobile enterprise application end-points. They’re going to need exactly the same kinds of security, policy enforcement and central manageability as anything else in the modern, Web 2.0-friendly, regulatory-compliant enterprise.”

What we think?

I’m a big believer in using network-based operations to solve the cross-platform problem in mobile. There are just so many devices, so many manufacturers, so many operating systems. These all require app developers to create differently tweaked versions for a literal multitude of mobile phones. It would be back-breakingly expensive to customise an app for all them - in terms of both money and time. So not only is this service a boon for businesses, it also helps out on the developer side. I’d be less enthusiastic about this except that OK Labs is already a marketplace presence, with deals in place with companies along points of the mobile value chain.