9 ms·

Apple Poaching Enterprise Sales Staff From Research in Motion

20 points by davidedicillo 16y ago

zdw 16y ago
Not surprising, as iOS is their major growth industry and Blackberry is the entrenched (and soon to be former courtesy of Android/iOS) player in that market. On the Mac side of things, they're cutting back on enterprise sales (witness the death of the Xserve) and pushing most of the contact information for smaller customers to the retail business people.
- thesethings 16y ago
  I have only seen + heard the opposite about Apple cutting back on enterprise sales of any kind. (Up until two-ish years ago, they made very little outreach to enterprise at all, just because they don't do roadmaps, don't have special support for "enterprise," etc.) Your retail-business theory is what I thought of as Apple's old strategy. They just engaged Unisys to support and infiltrate the enterprise (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-25/apple-enlists-unisys-to-crack-nut-with-pc-based-corporate-u-s-agencies.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-25/apple-enlists-unisy...) I'm not saying your interpretation of the Xserve discontinuation is wrong, just that i hadn't seen anybody with that interpretation before, and i'd love to hear more.
  - zdw 16y ago
    My sources are in Apple Retail, and from what I can piece together, Apple's enterprise sales is truly becoming that - going after Fortune 500 companies, when previously if you had more than 50-100 people and/or computers you were fair game for the enterprise department. Thus, their enterprise department is shrinking, but becoming more focused. In the past, there was a lot of poaching of deals between departments within Apple - retail would make a deal for >30 machines with an organization, only to have Enterprise call the customer up (they share CRM) and offer the exact same deal with a price below what Retail was allowed to discount. It's an internal org chart change, as far as I can tell. Why have dedicated enterprise reps in a phone center somewhere that can't have a face-to-face interaction with the customer, when in a lot of areas there's a retail store that can provide that, and get halo sales to employees, etc.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
zyb09 16y ago
Apple can't succeed in the Enterprise market the way RIM does unless they do two things: - Make a cheap iPhone. Something companys can hand out to their employees for $200 a piece. - Make a iPhone with a physical keyboard. I can't really see them doing any of that, but who knows for sure.
- boredguy8 16y ago
  I agree broadly with your point, but I fail to see why a physical keyboard is important except to a very small subset of users. Swype handles all the text input I need, and does so about 20%-30% faster than my physical keyboard. Now, this is on a first generation Motorola Droid. I have seen some students that are pretty wicked fast on their Blackberry. We haven't 'raced' yet. Maybe it's just a bad keyboard design on the Droid?
  - ergo98 16y ago
    Do you post HN comments using your touchscreen? If not, why not? I've done the keyboard smartphone thing, and the touchscreen smartphone thing (incl. swype with the latter). I prefer a real keyboard overwhelmingly -- even a miserable keyboard like on the HTC Dream -- and I know I'm far from alone. When someone sends me an email or a text requiring a response, honestly it is a sad, defeated feeling when I have to respond on the touchscreen keyboard. I know I'm hardly alone with this: iPhone toting friends and peers tend not to author any content on their device beyond the occasional "lol" or "brb" type response (you know instantly that they're hacking it on the screen), whereas others with Blackberry devices or physical keyboards...I often can't tell from their response whether they are at their desk or remote because they don't artificially abbreviate their comments. I'm sure there are non-typists or those of few words who are completely satisfied without a keyboard. Most others simply accept it.
    - enjo 16y ago
      Have you used Swype? It's a touchscreen keyboard, but works in a very different way. Since your not physically lifting your finger you can really plow through words really quickly. Much faster than I ever could with a blackberry style Keyboard for me at least.
boredguy8 16y ago
Unless and until there's a fundamental philosophy change at Apple, I don't see them being successful in the enterprise market. I'm in education, and we're a fairly flexible-yet-enterprise-y place, and we've constantly been burnt by Apple's lack of exposed forward planning (even when we spend literally millions of dollars with them annually). I'll believe Apple is seriously interested in the enterprise market when there's a docking port on the MacBook. Either that, or they'll hoodwink everyone into doing what we were told before: buy a laptop and a desktop for people, and sync between the two.
- catch23 16y ago
  So enterprise means a macbook docking port?
  - boredguy8 16y ago
    I don't know how you'd get that from what I wrote. I don't know how to respond without repeating myself, as nothing in your post indicates where I lost you. Fundamentally the problem is a "lack of exposed forward planning". I'll believe they're interested when they have a docking station as an effective means of switching between desktop use and laptop use and stop suggesting that people spend 60%-70% more in hardware alone per person by purchasing both a laptop and desktop. Either that, or they'll manage to get their philosophy so engrained that immediate cost is trumped by some other value proposition.
- ceejayoz 16y ago
  You can buy a docking port for your Macbook. http://www.bookendzdocks.com/Docking_Stations-Docking_Station_for_13_MacBook_White.html http://www.bookendzdocks.com/Docking_Stations-Docking_Statio...
  - boredguy8 16y ago
    Thanks for sharing the link. I'm familiar with all the major 3rd party options. That's not the same as plopping an HP into a docking brick, and no one I know that's used both thinks it's remotely comparable. Just getting the ports lined up correctly each time led one of our techs to abandon the whole effort.
nradov 16y ago
IBM added iPhone support to Lotus Notes Traveller in the last release. It provides mobile access to Lotus Notes/Domino mail, calendar, and directory. That removed a barrier to adoption for many enterprises. Several of our executives are using it now with good results. http://www-01.ibm.com/software/lotus/products/notes/traveler.html http://www-01.ibm.com/software/lotus/products/notes/traveler...

20 points by davidedicillo 16y ago

zdw 16y ago

Not surprising, as iOS is their major growth industry and Blackberry is the entrenched (and soon to be former courtesy of Android/iOS) player in that market. On the Mac side of things, they're cutting back on enterprise sales (witness the death of the Xserve) and pushing most of the contact information for smaller customers to the retail business people.

thesethings 16y ago
I have only seen + heard the opposite about Apple cutting back on enterprise sales of any kind. (Up until two-ish years ago, they made very little outreach to enterprise at all, just because they don't do roadmaps, don't have special support for "enterprise," etc.) Your retail-business theory is what I thought of as Apple's old strategy. They just engaged Unisys to support and infiltrate the enterprise (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-25/apple-enlists-unisys-to-crack-nut-with-pc-based-corporate-u-s-agencies.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-25/apple-enlists-unisy...) I'm not saying your interpretation of the Xserve discontinuation is wrong, just that i hadn't seen anybody with that interpretation before, and i'd love to hear more.
- zdw 16y ago
  My sources are in Apple Retail, and from what I can piece together, Apple's enterprise sales is truly becoming that - going after Fortune 500 companies, when previously if you had more than 50-100 people and/or computers you were fair game for the enterprise department. Thus, their enterprise department is shrinking, but becoming more focused. In the past, there was a lot of poaching of deals between departments within Apple - retail would make a deal for >30 machines with an organization, only to have Enterprise call the customer up (they share CRM) and offer the exact same deal with a price below what Retail was allowed to discount. It's an internal org chart change, as far as I can tell. Why have dedicated enterprise reps in a phone center somewhere that can't have a face-to-face interaction with the customer, when in a lot of areas there's a retail store that can provide that, and get halo sales to employees, etc.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

zyb09 16y ago

Apple can't succeed in the Enterprise market the way RIM does unless they do two things: - Make a cheap iPhone. Something companys can hand out to their employees for $200 a piece. - Make a iPhone with a physical keyboard. I can't really see them doing any of that, but who knows for sure.

boredguy8 16y ago
I agree broadly with your point, but I fail to see why a physical keyboard is important except to a very small subset of users. Swype handles all the text input I need, and does so about 20%-30% faster than my physical keyboard. Now, this is on a first generation Motorola Droid. I have seen some students that are pretty wicked fast on their Blackberry. We haven't 'raced' yet. Maybe it's just a bad keyboard design on the Droid?
- ergo98 16y ago
  Do you post HN comments using your touchscreen? If not, why not? I've done the keyboard smartphone thing, and the touchscreen smartphone thing (incl. swype with the latter). I prefer a real keyboard overwhelmingly -- even a miserable keyboard like on the HTC Dream -- and I know I'm far from alone. When someone sends me an email or a text requiring a response, honestly it is a sad, defeated feeling when I have to respond on the touchscreen keyboard. I know I'm hardly alone with this: iPhone toting friends and peers tend not to author any content on their device beyond the occasional "lol" or "brb" type response (you know instantly that they're hacking it on the screen), whereas others with Blackberry devices or physical keyboards...I often can't tell from their response whether they are at their desk or remote because they don't artificially abbreviate their comments. I'm sure there are non-typists or those of few words who are completely satisfied without a keyboard. Most others simply accept it.
  - enjo 16y ago
    Have you used Swype? It's a touchscreen keyboard, but works in a very different way. Since your not physically lifting your finger you can really plow through words really quickly. Much faster than I ever could with a blackberry style Keyboard for me at least.

boredguy8 16y ago

Unless and until there's a fundamental philosophy change at Apple, I don't see them being successful in the enterprise market. I'm in education, and we're a fairly flexible-yet-enterprise-y place, and we've constantly been burnt by Apple's lack of exposed forward planning (even when we spend literally millions of dollars with them annually). I'll believe Apple is seriously interested in the enterprise market when there's a docking port on the MacBook. Either that, or they'll hoodwink everyone into doing what we were told before: buy a laptop and a desktop for people, and sync between the two.

catch23 16y ago
So enterprise means a macbook docking port?
- boredguy8 16y ago
  I don't know how you'd get that from what I wrote. I don't know how to respond without repeating myself, as nothing in your post indicates where I lost you. Fundamentally the problem is a "lack of exposed forward planning". I'll believe they're interested when they have a docking station as an effective means of switching between desktop use and laptop use and stop suggesting that people spend 60%-70% more in hardware alone per person by purchasing both a laptop and desktop. Either that, or they'll manage to get their philosophy so engrained that immediate cost is trumped by some other value proposition.
ceejayoz 16y ago
You can buy a docking port for your Macbook. http://www.bookendzdocks.com/Docking_Stations-Docking_Station_for_13_MacBook_White.html http://www.bookendzdocks.com/Docking_Stations-Docking_Statio...
- boredguy8 16y ago
  Thanks for sharing the link. I'm familiar with all the major 3rd party options. That's not the same as plopping an HP into a docking brick, and no one I know that's used both thinks it's remotely comparable. Just getting the ports lined up correctly each time led one of our techs to abandon the whole effort.

nradov 16y ago

IBM added iPhone support to Lotus Notes Traveller in the last release. It provides mobile access to Lotus Notes/Domino mail, calendar, and directory. That removed a barrier to adoption for many enterprises. Several of our executives are using it now with good results. http://www-01.ibm.com/software/lotus/products/notes/traveler.html http://www-01.ibm.com/software/lotus/products/notes/traveler...