Tag: enterprise app development
Top 5 benefits of outsourcing software development services
Software development outsourcing is empowering companies worldwide, including the most successful ones across their journeys. Leading players like Google, WhatsApp, Slack, and Microsoft have ample stories to share on their victorious feats with outsourcing development.
A study by Technavio reveals that the global IT outsourcing market will flourish at a CAGR of 5% during the period 2020-2024. The demand for outsourcing software development services keeps surging as organizations want to optimize their business processes and align their strategic planning with their operational strategies.
Outsourcing your IT necessities can be a boon in times of financial and natural adversities because outsourcing companies like Fingent implement business continuity planning and disaster recovery plans to fulfill obligations and deliver services without interruption.
If your company’s growth is dependent on software, and if you cannot afford your in-house IT team to divert from their core operations, it’s high time to outsource your software development needs.
Why software outsourcing is good for your business?
Facts and testimonies speak the truth!
More and more businesses today are relying on software outsourcing companies to develop their projects. Working with an outsourcing company will help you mitigate the risks of running a project internally. Outsourcing can compensate for a lack of in-house skills and ensures that your product is delivered on time.
At Fingent, we specialize as an offshore software development company. Many of our customers have shared their outsourcing success stories with us. A .NET based SaaS platform developed by Fingent has played a great role in the growth of the property management undertaking – SimpleRent. Here’s what SimpleRent’s founder told us.
PwC, one of our prominent customers, reports an 80% increase in productivity and a 67% faster ticket resolution rate after Fingent helped them implement a smart ticketing system. Thanks to outsourcing!
As an outsourcing development company, here are a few reasons why we think outsourcing makes your business more efficient and smarter.
Related Reading: Points to Consider Before Choosing the Best Software Development Company
1. Access to the finest talent and latest technology
Software development outsourcing helps in finding the right talents and minimizing your human-resource problems. If your country has a limited talent pool, outsourcing gives you access to a wider talent pool available anywhere on the globe.
Technology keeps evolving every day and your business needs to take advantage of its benefits. With outsourcing, you will gain access to new and innovative perspectives and an opportunity to utilize strong and diverse technology expertise.
2. Outsourcing cuts down your costs
The biggest benefit of offshore software development undoubtedly is the cost savings. Outsourcing software development companies do not necessarily demand you to make any upfront investments. By contracting work to other companies, you can cut down 70-90% of your labor costs, all while paying your outsourced workforce at competent rates. The cost advantages make your development project more attractive and reduce your overall workload.
Adopting a cost-effective engagement model is crucial to the success of outsourcing. We help you choose the right engagement model essential for the creation of your state-of-the-art product.
3. Improved flexibility and time management
When you outsource your work, you don’t have to spend time hiring and training resources. At Fingent, we take care of all the change requirements even when the project sizes vary or resource-related demands scale up.
Outsourcing software development services accelerate your time-to-market. With people working around the clock, your competitiveness improves greatly and gives you an edge over your competitors.
4. Take your business to the next level with a focused strategy
To win the technological race, you need to have a focused strategy. Every business needs to align its operational strategy with the changing people, process, and technology. When your software is developed by an outsourcing company, your business processes will be highly streamlined and optimized, allowing you to focus on the core activities that will take your business to the next level.
5. Managing risks and compliance
Partnering with a software outsourcing company like Fingent enables you to mitigate the risks associated with handling your project. We follow a high-quality project management system that has been tried, tested and proven across our past as well as ongoing projects.
While outsourcing your software development needs, you are setting out to work with a global talent pool. We take care of all the legal compliance-related matters that have to be fulfilled while onboarding offshore resources as well as forging contracts with our clients. This lets you focus on other things that matter.
Related Reading: The Pros and Cons of Outsourcing Mobile App Development
Ready to outsource your software development needs?
From resource hiring and onboarding to management training and payroll software, several functions can be outsourced by a company. In the age of globalization and technological competition, software development outsourcing is the key to your success. Share your queries and concerns about outsourcing with us. Our consultants can walk you through the best and most affordable solution that works for you.
Re-Engineer your Business Processes with Superior Solutions Now!
Businesses in the present are making every move to ensure that they stay ahead of their competitors in the market. A rapid growth in terms of market share, revenues and customer base is desired by every business unit. One of the strategies being used by the businesses to ensure faster growth is the development and deployment of the enterprise mobility applications.
Enterprise Mobility is the trend that allows the employees of a business organization to work remotely to fulfill the business tasks and activities using mobile devices, mobile applications, and cloud-based solutions. An enterprise mobility application refers to a mobile app that is developed to target the enterprise-related problems.
Enterprise mobile applications can enhance business growth for companies in the following ways:
- Better Work-Life Balance
Every employee engaged with an organization aspires to maintain a healthy balance between the professional and personal commitments. Enterprise Mobility Applications allow the employees to experience better flexibility by allowing them to carry out business tasks from any of the remote location. 69% of the IT decision-makers support the idea of BYOD as they have witnessed positive results with the inclusion of the same. Workers in the United States on an average save 81 minutes per week with the aid of BYOD. There are 49% employees that say that they are more productive while working on their personal devices.
- Improved Workflow
Critical issues may crop up in a business environment anytime, without prior notices or hints. Enterprise mobile applications allow the employees to resolve such issues on an urgent basis irrespective of their presence and availability at the office location. Real-time interactions are also made possible with the clients that result in better customer engagement and satisfaction. The overall workflow, therefore, improves with the use of such applications.
- Reduction in Costs
Enterprise mobile apps can be made compatible and accessible on the personal devices of the staff members. It leads to the reduction in the cost of the devices and the share may be used in other significant business requirements.
- System Independence
There is a higher level of system independence provided to the employees with the use of enterprise mobility applications. It leads to the execution of the tasks from any network and the tools are installed in the devices of the employees.
- Reduced Paperwork
More paperwork leads to increase the number of risks in the business, such as loss of documents, replication of data and inefficiency in the storage and management of the documents. With the use of enterprise mobility applications, there are electronic documents that are used for sharing and transactions. These are easier to maintain and can also be processed at a faster pace as compared to the paper-based documents. The overall business speed, therefore, gets enhanced as a result.
- Customer Engagement
With the improvement of the workflow of a business and the non-stop availability of the employees, the customers feel connected with the organization. There are higher levels of transparency that can be maintained to gain customer trust and satisfaction. Rapid resolution of the defects and issues along with urgent sharing of information are some of the abilities that are made possible through the enterprise mobility applications. It leads to the better engagement with the customers and the reputation of the business organization also improves in the market.
- Empowers the Field Workers
There are several businesses that include a lot many field workers to carry out operational business activities. These field workers may experience certain issues such as difficulty in understanding a task or emergence of a conflict between two resources. Enterprise mobility applications may be used in such scenarios to contact the team heads and managers for maintaining the continuity of the operations. Also, activities such as status reporting and sharing of information can be done in a matter of seconds. All of these capabilities lead to enhancement of the processing speed of the operations resulting in faster business growth.
There are technological innovations and advancements that are being carried out with each passing day. It is required for the business organizations to remain updated with the technological changes and adapt the same to their functioning. The practice will allow the business units to achieve their goals accurately and rapidly. Enterprise mobility applications are a contribution of technology that has benefitted a lot many organizations. However, the inclusion of these applications in the business architecture may vary from one business unit to the other. Factors such as nature of the business, projects that are undertaken by the organization, customer expectations, project team members etc. shall be considered before moving on to the use of enterprise mobility applications.
With the internet, especially mobile internet now a way of life, businesses are going overboard developing enterprise apps. A 2015 Gartner survey reveals 79% of enterprises increase their mobile spending by 36%. These numbers are increasing every year and for good reasons.
Here are the basic reasons why enterprises are going overboard, developing mobile apps for their internal and external stakeholders.
1. Enterprise Apps Improve Productivity and Efficiency
Very few businesses can get away with slack in today’s highly competitive business environment. Enterprises looking to remain competitive have no option but to go all out in improving internal efficiency and boosting employee productivity, and enterprise apps contribute in a big way on both these fronts.
Enterprises apps increase employee productivity, help to optimize business processes to bring in process efficiency, and unlock insights which drive new business models. It facilitates a lean business model, with greater transparency, facilitating operations with reduced inventory and just-in-time inventory fulfillment practices.
Often, employees hit a roadblock in their quest to do something by being unable to access the required data. Enterprise apps make it easy to retrieve data. Moreover, one of the important pre-requisite before developing enterprise apps is removing data silos and fostering transparency, for apps to retrieve the data in the first place.
Mobile apps simplify what would otherwise be convoluted and even confusing processes. Armed with an app, the employee would know exactly what to do and how to do, without the risk of errors or procedural delays.
The single biggest drag on employee productivity is searching for information, preparing reports, and other routine “maintenance” tasks. Enterprise apps automate most of these processes, leaving the employee free to work on their core responsibilities.
2. Enterprise Apps Empower Field Workers
Today’s businesses are extremely mobile. They often work from multiple locations and have no option but to become go-getters, reaching out to customers at their site rather than expect them to visit their premises. The importance of sales and service has also increased manifold. A vast number of businesses, from delivery services to long-haul truck drivers, and from airport mechanics to courier companies, have agents or technicians on the field.
Until recently all these businesses were constrained by lack of real-time access to their technicians. Scheduling remote work was hit-and-miss, with the site visit depending on many variables with the main office having no control or visibility into what is going on.
Smart devices, such as tablets and smartphones, powered by enterprise apps, not just allow remote workers to remain connected to their office, but also offer real-time insights into the process. They feeding first-hand data from the ground to the enterprise system, and get analyzed data, in a recursive cycle, to gain unparalleled insights. At the customer end, full transparency and visibility into the field workers movements make the wait for service to arrive less agonizing.
Sales executives get all insights related to the customer he or she is about to visit. Their mobile app taps into all relevant data, subject it to real-time analytics and makes it available in easily consumable formats. Likewise, the executive, during the course of the meeting, can crunch data, make follow-ups, make commitments, or show projections, instantly, without having to make follow-up visits and lose the momentum.
It gets better. With IoT soon coming into the mix, remote devices can communicate with the main office, sending signals on what exactly is wrong, allowing field service technicians to make the site visit with the right tools and spares, sparing the need to make re-visits. Likewise, augmented reality (AR), artificial intelligence and other cutting-edge technology enable even rookie field service technicians to perform complex tasks, with support from experienced hands situated even in another continent, with AR powered enterprise apps offering seamless connectivity.
3. Enterprise Apps Increase Engagement and Sales
Customer facing enterprise apps drive sales and improve customer satisfaction manifold.
E-commerce apps make it easier for customers to buy. Often customers, wanting to buy a product, are put off by the complexity of the whole process, or the need to take time out to visit the e-commerce website. The easy-to-use mobile app makes the product available in just a few easy and convenient swipes. The same convenience holds true for reaching out to the company to make inquiries, and log complaints or support tickets.
4. Enterprise Apps Unlock New Insights
In today’s information heavy age, all businesses end with up tons of data. Such data could be a source of competitive advantage if subject to analytics, to derive actionable and relevant insights. Much of the big data is unstructured in nature, in the form of MS-Word documents, emails, videos, and embedded sensor data. Using intuitive enterprise apps powered by highly intuitive analytic tools, business managers and executives may subject such data to backend analytics, and gain actionable insights, allowing them to make more informed decisions that take guesswork and “gut-feelings” out of the equation.
An automated data analysis and presentation system collect data from a variety of sources, from shipments to warranty claims, and from failure analysis reports to bills, analyze the data automatically, and offers the insights to those who benefit from it. It requires custom apps to establish the data flow, make the required analysis and personalize the presentation mechanism.
For instance, when a customer enters a store, the executive who engages with the customer enters the customer’s name or telephone number into his app, which runs on a tablet or smartphone. The intuitive backend gathers all information residing internally, including purchase history, customer support ticket information and more, and also access the latest social media information to understand current taste and information. Such information is processed in real time, analyzed to identify the product range, price range and other preferences of the customer, allowing the executive to showcase relevant products and offer deals that really strike a chord. Without an app, powered by analytics backend, such information would be near-impossible to obtain, and definitely not in real-time.
5. Rolling out Enterprise Apps is Pandering to the Market
As the adage goes, “nothing is as powerful as an idea whose time has come.” Mobility is an idea that has gained currency and is now well entrenched. Today’s sophisticated users, both internal employees and external customers prefer simple interfaces as a means to deal with the underlying complexity, and they see intuitive web apps as the solution. Businesses who does not invest in enterprise apps stand the risk of alienating their stakeholders.
While conventional web-based interfaces may offer a solution to a limited extent, the changing nature of business and internet, especially the increasing number of people on the move make mobile apps expedients. Most users today anyway expect a higher level of usability and performance than what a web-based interface can deliver.
The best enterprise software is reliable, robust and up-to-date. Blindly rolling out apps left, right, and center, for the sake of it does no good. The enterprise app strategy succeeds only when there is clarity on what an app actually delivers that other touch points cannot, and then executing the app development process well, with an easy interface and powerful functionality. It helps to outsource the app development process to a competent agency who has experience and expertise in the work, and for whom developing an app won’t be a distraction from their daily routine.
IT is all about talent, how skillful and creative developers apply their talent to technology, to develop cutting edge solutions to solve a problem or unlock some latent possibilities. The role of Human Resource, responsible for acquiring and nurturing is very much underestimated and often overlooked, in such a scheme of things.
HR is today a key enabler of the organization’s strategic goals, having grown from its earlier avatar of functional “Personnel Management” to assume a complex role that cuts across all aspects of the business.
The Need for an HRIS
Realizing HR’s strategic mission necessitates the HR team to align its approach with the broader business model. Often, HR is trapped in transactional activities that add little value to the overall enterprise. For HR to add value, all its activities, including transactional activities, have to be integrated into organizational goals. The need of the hour is strong systems that integrate processes, eliminates silos, and reduces paperwork. A key enabler in this front is HRIS (Human Resource Information System), which is just as important as a CRM or ERP for the enterprise. A good HRIS not only enables automation and standardization of key processes but also forges deep integration with other systems running in the enterprise. Such a systems-driven approach gives key stakeholders access to the complete information in real time, improving the quality of their decisions.
HR and Big Data
A solid HRIS goes beyond enabling linkage top HR functions. In today’s tech-heavy world, data is a key source of competitive advantage, and HR holds the most crucial data related to the internal trappings of the enterprise – that of its people. Unlocking the big data HR holds by incorporating a robust analytic engine to the HRIS can yield rich insights and transform the workings of the enterprise.
An effective analytics based HRIS that pull, aggregates and analyze data from various sources, brings accuracy and clarity to all workforce-related processes.
Compensation
Today’s competitive pressures force many businesses to tie staffing and compensation decisions to specific business problems. To further this end, many enterprises now use workforce analytics systems, integrating HR data with information from sales, finance and other business operations. The reports and forecasts generated by workforce analytic systems become the basis to determine compensation and benefits packages.
Forging a sound compensation-related analytics system for HR requires effective coordination between HR and IT, not just to get the technical backbone up and running, but to identify the skill-set and relative worth of every skill.
Workforce Management
Many HR technology vendors now integrate analytics to not just payroll, but also to hiring and people management platforms. A 2016 Deloitte survey reveals 48% of businesses using staff analytics for workforce planning, with 39% correlating data about their employees to business performance
In today’s fast-paced world, where roles and opportunities remain fluid, and nothing is left in stone, analytics help HR predict with a great degree of accuracy how to effectively adjust and allocate the workforce to keep pace with changing business needs.
Training and Development
Training is an integral part of inculcating employees with the latest skills, so essential in today’s fast-changing business and technology environment. Smart HR, attuned to today’s competitive pressures, make an effective team with the tech team, to identify people who require training, and devise the most appropriate “push” or “pull” training methodologies. In an ideal enterprise, HR is the coordinator and the patron of the training initiatives, and also links training effectiveness to performance initiatives.
Effective analytics helps HR gain insights into the execution of critical tasks, and identify the difference between desired performance and actual performance, drilled down to individual employees. This becomes the basis for designing a training and development plan for each employee.
HR as a Catalyst for Employee Engagement and Productivity
The HR strategy has an important, yet often overlooked the impact on employee engagement and productivity. In times of stability, the policies and systems in place inspire leadership and motivate the workforce to put in their best short. In times of change, how HR takes the lead in driving change has a big bearing on how employees buy the change, and remain motivated in the wake of new paradigms and changed realities. In today’s tech-centric enterprises, it requires effective coordination between HR and IT to develop robust systems that allow employees to remain productive, and bring stability during the times of change.
Harvard Business School defines Competitive advantage as “firm is something unique that competitors cannot easily copy.” For HR to create competitive advantage, it needs to develop systems and processes that maximize the abilities of the workforce and tap into organizational capabilities to the hilt. It requires well developed and robust solutions, in the form of mobile apps and more, to ensure the technical backbone of HR is up to the task, to realize competitive advantage. With our considerable experience in developing solutions across-the-board for hundreds of enterprises, we are in the best position to fulfill the void. Our team of highly resourceful and talented developers would understand your specific requirements, and develop cutting-edge solutions that propel your enterprise to a whole new level.
A mobile app offers tremendous potential for efficiency, growth, increased revenue, but only if executed right. The development stage is most critical, for faulty execution can render the effort waste, and result in a dysfunctional app that impedes rather than facilitates the business.
Success in developing mobile apps requires clarity of purpose and focus, and to attain it, developers and other stakeholders need to ask some crucial questions.
1. What is the Purpose of the App?
Many times, enterprises are too caught up in the mobility hype, and develop apps just for the sake of it. Such apps may not have a specific purpose, and may actually be another version of the corporate website.
Successful apps are highly focused, catering to a specific function, purpose, or niche. Zero in on the specific purpose, or the precise problem for which the app is being developed. Consider why an app is required for the purpose, how customers may benefit out of it, and how an app can be a better option than a responsive website.
2. Who are the Key Stakeholders?
It is imperative to identify the stakeholders associated with the app upfront. Understand who owns the app, who is funding it, who will be using it, who will benefit from it, who will be responsible for the data that would keep the app functional, who would be responsible for day to day maintenance of the app, and so on. Questions such as who are the decision makers, who all are empowered for the business side of the app, and more, are also pertinent.
The success of any app depends on successful communication with the stakeholders, to understand their requirements, gain clarity on their role, and take feedback. Understanding end users enable app designers to tweak their profile, improving the power of the app considerably.
3.What is the Deadline?
The deadline to release the app is often a function of the purpose. For instance, if the app is meant for a specific sporting event or concert, the entire work becomes waste if the app is not up and running in time for the event. Even otherwise, things change in today’s fast-paced world, and tight deadlines are more the norm than the exception. Even a few days delay can make a big difference in the patronage of the app, or the app serving its intended purpose.
Related to the deadline is the release schedule. It is common enough practice to have multiple release dates for an app, with each release adding new functionality on an incremental basis. Many apps launch different versions, such as for iPhone and Android, on different dates.
4.What is the Programming Methodology?
A basic upfront requirement when it comes to creating a mobile app is creating a wire-frame, which makes explicit how the user will experience and interact with the app. The visual designs and UX is also critical and requires addressing at the very onset.
Another essential requirement is to create product backlog that enables defining and prioritizing the functional and nonfunctional requirements of the app.
Any app requires application programming interfaces, outside services and systems, and integration with third-party vendors. Research on these aspects, arrange for the necessary integration, and factor in the time taken for achieving such validations.
5.How is the App going to be Hosted?
Consider whether the app would be plugged into an existing infrastructure, or whether new infrastructure, such as hosting space, need to be provisioned.
Apps also require post-launch support for bug fixes and tweaks based on user feedback.
6. From where will the App be Downloaded?
The delivery channels of the app can impact the design of the app. For B2B and B2C apps, getting listed on Google Play and iTunes store are critical, and the requirements for listing needs to be addressed at the design and development stage.
Read this blog to get few quick tips for faster approval of iOS apps.
7. What is the Security Blueprint?
Security is an important consideration in today’s high-stakes business environment. Provision adequate security protocols and ensure the code is secure, to pre-empt hackers attacking the corporate network through code vulnerability. A related task to be complete is drafting the privacy policy of the app.
8. Are there Corporate Guidelines or other Considerations to Adhere to?
Enterprise apps may have to adhere to corporate guidelines, such as branding conventions, consistent screen design, the design of the icons, and more. The impact is mostly felt in design considerations.
9. What are the Risks Associated with the Project?
Any app development will face risks and uncertainties that could impede or even subvert the project, or at the very least let timelines go awry. A best practice is to build a risk register at the onset, and document the actions and the stakeholders responsible for the action, for each risk factor.
10. What is the Budget?
The budget is often overlooked when it comes to developing mobile apps, and a major reason is the difficulty in estimating one. With the fragmented mobile marketplace, there are too many variables at play, including multiple operating systems, different testing environments, and more.
Also, an app project goes much beyond the coding and compilation. It involves several critical components such as researching for the app, undertaking competitor analysis, designing an intuitive UX, and more, and all these tasks can influence the budget in a big way. There are also hosting costs, on-going optimization of the app when in use, costs for push notification services, costs for scaling the back end as the user base grows, and more.
The possibilities are endless, but the budget brings in a reality check. The trick is to optimize the possibilities within the constraints of the available budget.
There is no one-size-fits-all method in developing a mobile app. The best approach is customising the process to suit the client. It requires the services of a seasoned and experienced partner who knows to ask the right questions, and guide the client to get the right answers as well. We are competent in this front, having successfully developed a diverse range of mobile apps for many clients, cutting across industries. Contact us now and kick-start your enterprise app development process.
The only constant thing in today’s world is change. Enterprise software is likewise going through a major churn, to reflect changes in the wider ecosystem.
Until not too long ago, enterprise software development took a rigid and predictable model of requisitioning-requirements gathering-code writing-testing-delivery. The end product, which often took months or even years to develop, was delivered through desktops and laptops. Many enterprises, risk-averse as they are, stuck on to such time-tested formulas. However, the times they are a-changing and enterprises soon began to find out the hard way that who do not change inevitably find themselves “drenched to the bone,” if they aren’t already.
1. Enterprise Software is Becoming Lean, Mean, and Fast
Competitive pressures force today’s businesses to become lean and mean. The fast-paced business environment also raises the need for speed. Businesses are now hard-pressed to take decisions, to take advantage of an opportunity during the short window while it lasts. Likewise, businesses have no option but to be flexible and agile, to seize opportunities in the way it comes, and to please highly demanding customers. Unless the enterprise software, on which business processes and workflows run, are itself is not agile and seamless, businesses cannot position itself to be agile.
Today’s enterprise software seeks to leverage the power of simplicity. However, the need to deliver a simple front end, while ensuring the software is power-packed, often results in a complex backend. The wide range of emerging technologies both in the development and delivery process facilitates the reconciliation. A case in point is the emerging Docker technology that enables developers to create code that can run in their own containers, making the apps nimble.
Today’s enterprise software users are also far less tolerant of bugs and inefficiencies in software applications, and expect developers to implement fixes, and roll out updates rapidly.
2. Functional Programming is Gaining Centrestage
The high velocity of change forces IT leaders to innovate. One innovation that has caught on and now become the norm is functional programming. Many enterprises now build several small software components using functional components, and then architecture systems out of many such small software components
With the focus on speed and ease, enterprise apps are now becoming highly focused, including only what is really required, doing away with the frivolous. Instead of a single bloated one-size-fits-all enterprise app or software, enterprises are developing specific apps for specific functions. Tying the different front end apps together is a cloud-based backend and database, to which the apps sync seamlessly.
There is a new approach to the nature and structure of coding enterprise software as well. Developers are also abandoning the lengthy process of collecting specs and rather going ahead with a project through a new Minimum Viable Product (MVP) approach. The MVP may be regarded as a “lite” version of a feature concept, requiring just a fraction of the time that it takes to build the full feature. After releasing the MVP product and gathering feedback, developers upgrade it to a full blown version.
Time tested procedural programming languages such as C and Java still retain their dominance, but new functional programming languages such as Scala, Erlang and Clojure,noted for the power, are fast gaining ground.
3. The Rise of Collaboration
Enterprise software is increasingly becoming business driven by business users, rather than tech-heavy. While hitherto businesses adjusted their processes according to what the tech team dished out, today business managers are key stakeholders in the development process.
A trend fast gaining ground is DevOps, a spin-off from the time-tested agile and lean methods of software delivery. DevOps basically entails bringing together a cross-disciplinary community, who build and evolve highly flexible and resilient systems. The different stakeholders associated with enterprise software, including coders, operations engineers, managers, and others come together and involve in all stages of application development, right from design to testing.
4. Enterprise Software is Becoming Analytic Heavy
Today’s businesses are increasingly becoming data driven, and facilitating the trend is big developments in deep learning and analytical capabilities.
Most enterprise software today come with built-in analytic capabilities that allow users to scour available data and generate customized reports, on-the-fly. Technologies such as Apache Spark enable businesses to develop machine learning capabilities more easily than before.
However, the successful application of analytics to crunch data requires contextual analytics. In other words, enterprise software developers need to ensure the application of analytics to data is based on a deep contextual understanding of what is relevant. Human judgment may work in some ad-hoc cases, but has its limitations, and in any case, impedes seamless operations. There is no workaround to develop a working contextual awareness model for data analytics.
5. The Cloud, Mobility, and Security
The two big changes in recent times, the cloud and mobility have its impact on enterprise software as well. While some enterprises still run enterprise software applications on in-house servers, more and more enterprises are migrating to the cloud, and opting for the SaaS model. SaaS ensures greater flexibility, anytime, anywhere availability, and lesser total cost of operations (TCO.) SaaS also facilitates mobility, or delivery of enterprise apps through mobile apps, which is now indispensable considering the prevalence of a highly mobile workforce and the need to remain connected at all times.
However, the cloud, the mobility, and the Bring your own device (BYOD) programs raise the stakes of security. Enterprise software developers are smartly but slowly realizing the need to develop robust code and plug vulnerabilities that prevent debilitating attacks from malicious intruders, both internal and external, out to steal confidential data, intellectual property, and trade secrets.
Enterprise software development is now evolving into a continuous process, a distinct shift from a one-off project approach. In this constant battle to stay relevant and stay secure, your in-house IT teams, who has more pressing priorities, is sure to be swamped. Partner with us if you want to leverage the skill sets of our highly talented and resourceful team of developers, backed up by our experience in delivering hundreds of powerful and customized enterprise apps.
Enterprise mobility has come a long way in improving organizational efficiency and helping companies empower their workforce digitally. It has been estimated that by 2020 the global revenue generated by enterprise mobility software market would surpass $140 billion annually. With a compound annual growth rate of 15%, it is also expected to be spearheading nearly 15 to 20 percent of annual IT spending by global organizations. The driving forces behind the growing market for enterprise mobility products are the increased productivity factor for mobile workforce and the availability of low-cost smart devices. 2016 is running to a close and so we decided to have a glance of what’s going to be the state of Enterprise Mobility in 2017.
Let us see the direction in which enterprise mobility will head into in 2017:
Market Focus
As usual, 2017 has a very robust growth outlook in existing markets especially North America, which will be the primary leader globally in terms of enterprise mobility adoption. However there will be a new name on the top of the list for fastest growing markets – Asia Pacific (APAC). With a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 21 percent, APAC markets are expected to be an area of huge focus for enterprise mobility product vendors.
Flexible Device Management
Very recently, Forrester claimed that mobility is of prime importance for 71% of organizations. This means they will promote almost all kinds of mobile devices amongst its workforce. Bring Your Own Device or BYOD as it is affectionately known globally, will create room for newer policies in device management and control. Integrating flexibility into the BYOD ecosystem will be a challenge as good majority of employees would utilize the same device for personal and office use.
Information on the Go
Taking a leaf out of the previous trend, the rapid rise in number of devices will pose another challenge for information access. Enterprise data or information would be scattered across multiple organizational departments, hierarchies, geographical locations, etc. But for the end user or mobile workforce, all they need is information on the go, at their fingertips. Cross channel and intra-organizational data communication policies would face increasing pressure to synchronize information across mediums so that more informed decisions can be taken by end users.
Cloud Synchronization
It is hard to call Cloud a buzzword now not because it is irrelevant but because it is a norm for the entire tech world. From music to high end computing, consumers and enterprises are exploiting the world of cloud computing to manage their data. Enterprise mobility is no exception as cloud computing offers room for workforce to retrieve mission critical data from the cloud on demand rather than having to pre-integrate it with their devices. Application development for enterprise mobility too will face increased smoothness with more and more dev teams focusing on creating simple front end applications for mobile devices, while heavy duty tasks get organized and executed on private cloud infrastructure of the organization.
Security
Perhaps for the last few years, when people speak about trends in tech, especially when it involved data communication across channels, security had been the number one point on the list. Today we pick security to occupy a lower position, not because it has become a guaranteed surety, but because of the huge improvements that have been witnessed in the world of data security. Thanks to cloud computing, it is easier for enterprises to have a focused area to spend on information security. Whether companies opt for established cloud service providers like, Amazon Web Services or Microsoft Azure, or whether they build their own private cloud infrastructure is not a relevant question in today’s cloud security context. Cyber-attacks are increasingly being reported globally and hence it is imperative for organizations to lay strict emphasis on security policies. The most challenging security scenario in the case of enterprise mobility would be the unmonitored usage of device on insecure public networks. Security applications would definitely find huge market scope in the coming years.
Internet of Things (IoT)
IoT today is what cloud computing was 5 years ago – the rising area of focus for businesses. The ability of devices, or more specifically sensors, to communicate user data will be instrumental for future marketing campaigns to attract genuine customers. For enterprises, IoT will enable field service agents to better track their core operational data, which would then be utilized at higher levels to arrive at better decisions. Devices such as smartwatches and other wearable will begin to serve dual purposes such as personal convenience and official data collection mechanisms. The future looks bright for wearable and IoT tech.
Dedicated Mobile App Development Centers of Excellence
This is a culmination of all the above trends. With such a huge emphasis being directed towards enterprise mobility, organizations would require dedicated developer teams to build customizable solutions for enterprise mobility. These developers would be groomed as an agile workforce to support the massive amount of organizational activities being migrated to enterprise apps.
So there you have it folks, 7 trends we feel will shape the future of enterprise mobility in 2017 and beyond. Enterprise mobility is here to stay and is definitely moving in the direction of becoming a hotbed for tech innovations in the near future.
It’s boom time for mobile apps, thanks to the proliferation of smartphones, and the consequent mobile-first approach. Enterprises are rolling out apps by the dozens, not just to offer cutting-edge solutions to their customers, but also to manage their internal operational and business processes fluently.
However, amidst the din, the growth and trajectory of the mobile app development platform are influenced by several extraneous factors. Here are the top emerging trends shaping mobile application development for the next four years.
BYOD and BYOA Fuels Enterprise App Development
While “Bring your own devices” (BYOD) is already well entrenched for a few years now, employers are now rolling out “Bring your own access” (BYOA) as the next evolutionary step. BYOA is essentially wireless remote access to a company’s network, for home workers and executives on the move. The twin forces of BYOD and BYOA is creating a big surge in demand for enterprise application development services, as enterprises seek to offer employees access to the specific functionality and resources they require through apps.
By 2017, more than 50% of enterprises are expected to roll-out a minimum of ten mobile enterprise applications. Tools such as AngularJS, PhoneGap, Ionic, Sencha Touch, Cordova and others facilitate agile hybrid app development projects.
App Development to become Increasingly Open Source and Collaborative
“Open source” and “collaboration” are the in-thing in the app development ecosystem. Setting the trend, Swift, Apple’s open-source programming language, leapfrogged Objective-C both in popularity and usage, on the TIOBE index, in January 2016. About 76% of Hadoop users plan to use the tool more extensively in 2017, and only 3% plan to decrease its use.
But what is shaking the mobile app development market, even more, is the emergence of DevOps, a spin-off from the time-tested agile and lean methodologies. DevOps, derived from “development” and “operations” is an establishment of a cross-disciplinary community, involving developers, tech users, and other stakeholders of the software under development. The aim is to ensure open communication and collaboration among the various stakeholders, to build, evolve, and operate rapidly-changing resilient systems, at scale. DevOps especially automates application testing and deployment processes, reducing errors and speeding up the process considerably.
About 39% of global software development firms have already implemented DevOps technology to establish a collaborative app development environment.
A manifestation of how an increasingly collaborative development process can improve apps lies in UX development. UX or user experience becomes more important than ever before and is now a big parameter for measuring the success of a mobile application. App developers are now co-opting expert graphic artists, illustrators and animators to make their apps more visually appealing and user-friendly. Emerging trends, such as parallax graphics, grid-based interface designing, split-screens, splash screens, and micro-interactions, all of which are set to go mainstream in 2017 will raise the stakes for a collaborative platform that enables seamless communication with specialists in such new and emerging niches.
Side-by-side with increasing collaboration, app development is also set to become more democratic. Various do-it-yourself (DIY) tools and techniques, such as the Microsoft’s PowerApps, IBM’s Mobile First and more offer basic WYSIWYG design with custom templates and drag-and-drop functionality, and facilitate automated development. The Low Code or No Code “Citizen’s development” concept is still in its infancy, but can integrate with collaborative tools and gain traction.
The Cloud takes Centrestage in Backend Operations
About 75% of all smartphone users prefer apps with reliable server-side backend support that allows them to access the app on any device, from anywhere, without loss of data. Such cloud powered apps take minimal space in the phone storage as well.
The cloud makes multi-device synchronization of apps seamless, offer unprecedented flexibility in coding, testing, and launching apps, and speed up the app development cycle considerably. Cloud based mobile-backend-as-a-service (MBaaS) enable developers to build and install enterprises applications, to store enterprise data. Cloud integrated development environment (IDE) solutions, delivered through cloud platforms, allow developers to work in a collaborative environment. Full-stack software developers, front-end software developers, back-end software developers, community developers, mobile application developers and others leverage these tools to communicate and coordinate seamlessly.
New Technologies and Security Challenges Embrace Each Other
The Internet of Things is already a $19 trillion industry, and is expected to grow exponentially over the next five years. The number of connected devices is expected to touch 28 billion by 2020. As of now, IoT is mainly present in wearable technology, and some gadgets such as smart thermostats and smart bulbs. However, IoT will be the focal point of mobile application development in the next few years, with developers creating apps to deliver personalized user experiences across a variety of IoT enabled devices. Developers would increasingly incorporate not just smartphone features such as NFC and fingerprint scanning, but also emerging technologies such as mobile location services, location based wi-fi services, Beacon technology, GPS, and more, to make their apps smarter and dynamic.
Security has always been a major concern, and the much more vulnerable emerging technologies make the problem even more critical. In what is an ominous portent, most of the top 100 apps in the Google app store have already been hacked. The implication of an IoT breach is much more, having the potential to cause physical damage and even human lives.
While developers are currently hamstrung by the lack of uniform standards that defines acceptable user security against privacy breach, things are slowly changing. The 2016 Apple World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) makes it mandatory for all iOS applications to incorporate the robust App Transport Security, and also heavy encryption. The focus on security is set to increase in the coming days, with radically new approaches.
More than 58% of organizations have already deployed enterprise applications. However, demand for mobile enterprise apps will be about five times more than the combined supply capacity of developers! Do not miss the bus amidst the scramble for talent. Contact us to leverage our expertise and experience in rolling out mobile apps of the highest quality, to transform your business.