Why even a half decent Windows 8 tablet would rule the Enterprise

[javajolt]

If I was a CEO, CTO or CIO and I had to make decision about what tablets to buy for our organization, what would I choose?

If the question was asked today, in August, the answer would probably be – it depends – let’s wait and see about these new Windows 8 tablets.

Now to be clear, I love the Ipad. I bought an Ipad, got an Ipad 2 and will probably get an Ipad 3 when that comes out. It is, a supremely capable device.

In addition, there are a lot of apps being developed on the Ipad for the Enterprise. These applications are increasingly being developed in HTML and JavaScript and are (more and more) seamlessly able to connect to legacy applications.

From an executive’s perspective, this is attractive and would make the Ipad a serious contender for enterprise use.

In addition, employees know them, already use them and LOVE them.

Seems like a no brainer huh?

All my Apple friends use these points relentlessly and continue to insist that the Ipad will never be dethroned as the king of tablets.

I disagree. For several reasons.

Price

The Ipad remains very vulnerable at it’s price point. With taxes, a base 16 GB Ipad 2 that has Wifi only is about $538. That’s a lot of money. For consumers, thats a lot of money but even with a steep enterprise discount, that would be a ton of money to spend – if Microsoft had a similar tablet with a base price of $299. Multiply those numbers by 5,000 employees and you start to see who would win that discussion.

Development Languages

At this point, we are pretty sure that Microsoft will allow Windows 8 development staff to use .NET, Silverlight, XAML, JavaScript and HTML 5. The Ipad will allow for JavaScript, IOS and HTML 5. If that’s true, then an executive has to decide whether to make the investment in resources to support Apple development or simply use the team that already there in house. No brainer to me.

Integration

While the Ipad will allow development in JavaScript and HTML 5, it’s still a different (aka non PC) platform. Anyone who has extensive development experience can testify that it’s much more difficult to develop for 2 different platforms than staying on one common platform. This has to be strongly considered.

Security

In a Microsoft world, an Ipad is an Apple device. From an enterprise perspective, that means a foreign object on the network with all sorts of requirements for monitoring and maintenance. One more device you have to worry about upgrading and securing. A potential hassle.

Deployment

So we have 5,000 Ipads. How are we going to deploy them and make sure they are all up to spec and are able to support employees questions? If your current IT shop is all PC, you may need new deployment resources, new software, consulting firms etc. Not so much with a Windows 8 tablet.

Accountability

This is by far the most important.

Anyone who knows how enterprise projects are pitched, approved, developed, executed and supported knows that management usually has one major concern throughout the process.

“Who is responsible for this?”

This is Microsoft’s ace in the hole. If an organization already has an enterprise level agreement with Microsoft with established SLA’s in place, Microsoft need to throw Tablet support in there.

Their pitch needs to be:

“Why would you want to call both Microsoft and Apple on the phone? With Apple saying it’s our fault and our technicians not being able to troubleshoot Apple products, it becomes a royal mess. You need a single point of contact for all your support needs, you’re already paying a lot of money for it, why don’t you take advantage of it?”

That is something any executive has to seriously consider. Who wants to be on the phone with Apple support and have them point the finger at MSFT and vice versa?

Anyway, that’s my take. If Microsoft have a decent, affordable and competitive Windows 8 tablet, they’ll be just fine.