Death of the Desktop

Next session from Nick Jones on mobile and wireless trends through to 2018


Definition of mobility getting bigger and broader. Now it's an innovation powerhouse. No longer mobile strategy, but multichannel strategy. Mobile has to fit with all other channels. Overlaps between channels.
New gadgets coming out, eg smart watches.
IT folks lost control of it. Now have to cope with what employees bring through door. Consumersiation has won.
Mobile is now part of an ecosystem.

Smartphones about 50% of all handsets being shipped, but by 2016 will be 80%, mainly due to cheap android devices.
IOS will stay strong player.
Windows phones have small share of market, but might rise, uncertain.
RIM may not be saveable, will remain a niche vendor.
No winner, so multi platform is the only future.

At moment sales of tablets equal to notebook PCs, but will outship them by 2016. Definition of laptop, ultra book, tablets will become very blurred.
Multi formfactor future, as well as multi platform.
IOS will continue to dominate tablets for some time, but android strong in emerging markets.
Windows 8 tablets will be interesting to corporates, not consumers.

Resolution is growing on displays. Curved screens and flexible OLED screens are emerging. User Interface getting more sophisticated, eye tracking on its way. Near field communication rolling out slowly, touch to act technology - unlocking doors, discount vouchers from a poster, mobile payment.

Mobile HTML5 still a work in progress. Has a lot of vendor support, but lots of standards, it's incomplete, multiple inconsistent implementations, security challenges, fragmentation of hardware makes it difficult to work on many devices.
Write once, test everywhere technology.
Will take 3 to 5 years to mature.

Mobile apps will become more sophisticated and more complex:
Better user experiences, people less tolerant of poor experience. Cosmetic design, psychology and motivation, usability all important.
Multichannel integration. Decide which services and which channels
Increasing sophistication, augmented reality
Improved quality, customers want less bugs and better support. Single cause of complaint in App Store is bugs.
Cloud partners, for context, payment, marketing, navigation, location.

A mobile app for every "thing". Increasing integration with consumer electronics
Smart fork monitors how fast you are eating!
Asthma inhaler, sends signal, tracks asthma
Smart watches
Augmented reality displays
Look at crowd sourced ventures eg Kickstarter for where real innovation is.
and set becomes the hub of the personal network. Based on architecture of app, device, cloud.

IT either runs the business, grows the business, or transforms the business. Mobile can be used to do all three. Mobile is critical to CIO strategies.
Many CIOs think the desktop will be dead in the medium term, 40% of organisations will only have mobile by 2016.

We need new architectures, new methods and processes, agility is essential and testing is vital.

What architecture to use for apps - native, hybrid or HTML5 ? It's a business decision, not an IT decision. No right answer, all have a place.

Five key technologies to follow:
1 Mobile and Cloud
Expoit cloud for scalability, agility, SaaS
2 Multiplatform mobile Application Development tools
3 Secure, multiplatform document sharing
All senior knowledge workers have multiple devices. Dropbox almost become a corporate app. Sharing and synching of docs is essential
4 Mobile testing
Testing challenges will increase for several years
5 HTML5
Despite many challenges, mobile web apps are attractive for some uses.

Recommendations
Explore security of devices and apps, especially with BYOD
Find innovative ways to use mobile devices, apps and services
Don't go for a rigid one size fits all management of people and devices
Stop trying to manage things you can't control
Mobile strategy is a process not a document, update it frequently
Stay agile
Don't try to be an expert in all aspects of mobile app design and development, choose partners.

Another good session, and good set of recommendations





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