The move expands the distributors Samsung portfolio beyond hardware and into mobile device management and security software.

The distributor has been a Samsung mobile devices distributor for UK business-to-business markets since July last year. The addition of Knox means TD SYNNEX can now offer partners Samsung Galaxy devices and also management and security through a single channel.

Samsung Knox is used by organisations to configure, deploy and manage Samsung mobile devices. Tools cover device setup, policy enforcement and security controls.

James Reed, managing director of endpoint solutions for the UK and Ireland at TD SYNNEX (below), said partners will now be able to add managed deployment and security services to Samsung device sales. He added that Knox was a “natural extension” of the company’s existing relationship with Samsung.

Knox is offered in three tiers; Base, Essentials and Enterprise aimed at different business requirements. Knox has been in the market since 2013 and is used by thousands of organisations worldwide to manage big deployments of Samsung devices.

The appointment further reinforces TD SYNNEX’s focus on endpoint management and security as distributors compete to offer partners more complete device lifecycle and management propositions in the UK enterprise mobility market.

Although Samsung didn’t announce a new smartphone during CES this year, the vendor did however reaffirm its strong position on providing security and privacy for its users.

The topic was discussed during a keynote speech as Samsung introduced the ‘Age of Experience’, with a glimpse of its latest AI, 5G and edge computing innovations displayed to the audience. 

However it was towards the conclusion of the keynote speech that Samsung addressed privacy and security, as its consumer division president and CEO H.S. Kim reassured Samsung users that their data is safe. 

In his speech, Kim highlighted three key areas of particular importance for Samsung in the future which are security and privacy, technology for good and citizenship, with security Samsung’s top priority as technology advances.

“Samsung will never share your data with third parties without prior and direct consent from you,” said Kim.  

Kim also revealed that Samsung’s security platform Knox will continue to be developed in line with Samsung’s range of devices for continued protection. 

“We will further ensure transparent data management and transfer by advancing our data protection efforts with on-device AI, edge computing, and blockchain technology.” 

A report from CCS Insight firm, commissioned by Samsung Electronics, found an increasing ‘productivity gap’ in large organisations and a lack of security knowledge among start-ups.

Large companies are often burdened by set process, legacy technology, IT cost constraints and rising security concerns. The average company loses about one quarter productive output, equivalent to losing of $3 trillion (£2.2 trillion) a year in the US.

One-third of decision makers in large firms believe IT provisions do not meet their needs, double the number than in small businesses, which are highly agile, innovative and better connected, often via personal technology.

Digital Darwinism

However, the report warns in order to thrive in the era of ‘digital Darwinism’ new technologies are crucial. Internet of things (IoT), mobility, and artificial intelligence will rapidly shape business, companies of all sizes need to leverage technology in order to stay competitive.

It is also noted that start-ups display different approaches to mobile technology investments, which has become increasingly important with the growing prevalence of mobile working. One-third of workers in developed countries now fall into the ‘mobile worker’ category and by 2020, 48 per cent of the workforce in developing economies will also be classified as mobile, rising to 70 per cent among small businesses.

Collaboration

Samsung Europe head of B2B Phil Lander said: “Progressive technology can be part of the solution by allowing large businesses to collaborate with start-ups successfully and securely yet this report indicates that large organisations are still lagging behind in terms of both innovation and productivity.”

Lander continues: “The continuing digitalisation of business, combined with the rise in mobile working, highlights the importance of a platform like Samsung Knox and powerhouse smartphones like the new Galaxy Note8. Striking the right balance between open, flexible and mobile working and security will remain of fundamental importance as we move further towards a data-driven digital business culture.”

CCS Insight Enterprise Research Vice President Nick McQuire comments: “Our report underlines how both types of organisations’ future successes will lie in how well they understand one another, bridge their differences and work together.

“There are some shared attributes to success, such as the pressing need to prioritise device functions that make employees more productive on the move and specific lessons too. Large organisations must have greater tolerance for personal and new technologies and startups must prioritise security in their mobile strategies.”

]]> https://mobilenewscwp.co.uk/news/article/samsung-research-revels-increasing-productivity-gap-large-organisations/feed/ 0 https://mobilenewscwp.co.uk/news/article/tech-data-bolsters-reseller-portfolios-samsung-knox/ https://mobilenewscwp.co.uk/news/article/tech-data-bolsters-reseller-portfolios-samsung-knox/#respond Mon, 07 Aug 2017 10:12:56 +0000 https://mncwp.tailrd.cloud/tech-data-bolsters-reseller-portfolios-samsung-knox/ The Korean manufacturer claims multi-layered security for devices and trusted “by many governments worldwide”

Samsung is investing millions of pounds in its B2B arm after admitting its engagement with reseller partners and end users could be improved.

In an exclusive interview with Mobile News, Samsung enterprise business team VP Graham Long claimed there is a “significant opportunity” to place greater resource and investment into mobile operators in particular, providing them and customers reasons to buy from Samsung over others.

This has been driven by the recruitment of a number of industry veterans over recent months, helping the team focused primarily on mobile rise by a fifth to 70 staffers over the past year.

Deeper relationships

Long revealed Samsung has “significantly” bolstered team numbers working directly with operators (two to six with one, two to eight with another without revealing names) and is working with them to draw up marketing plans to boost its share. He claimed Samsung has now has the strongest B2B vendor organisation in the market.

“B2B is a huge focus for us. Our engagement with operators needs to be better and now is with the resource we have. Our marketing needs to be clearer. We see a big opportunity to place a significantly larger amount of resource and investment into the mobile operators because they engage with customers daily.

Standing out

“We have to do a better job providing people with reasons as to why our technology is as good if not better than our competitors. To do that, we need people in those organisations that are getting that message across.

“We’re saying to them that we’re going to invest significantly in people but provided we can come together with a joint plan, we will also invest significantly on a financial basis. We have looked at the resource we have and made sure we are focusing it in the areas we believe we can achieve the greatest return in the quickest way.

“There is nobody else who is able to put the level of resource and investment into the B2B market that we are. We have a fantastic line up and a significant amount of money to spend. When you put that all together, I can’t help but get excited.”

Strongest portfolio

Long added  that he felt Samsung now has the broadest portfolio among its manufacturer rivals, spanning smartphones, tablets, mobile security and virtual reality.

In March, Samsung re-entered the Windows market by making its Galaxy TabPro S tablet available to business customers, adding to its 20 existing Android-based tablets.

He claimed Samsung is still experiencing “fantastic success” with the Galaxy S6 and S7 phones, as well as in new technologies such as virtual reality headsets. For example, German car manufacturer Audi is using its Gear VR headset to enable people to take a test drive of its new car ranges.

Opportunity Knox

Samsung KNOX, the manufacturer’s security software product which was certified for government use last year, is now used by more than half of the police forces within the UK.

“We’re back in the Windows market with the launch of the Tab ProS, so we arguably now have the broadest portfolio of any manufacturer out there. We also have a very strong security proposition with KNOX.

“With the portfolio that we now have, it enables us to have a far richer conversation with our customers that any of our competitors do.”

Samsung will pre-install Microsoft services and apps on its range of Android devices after expanding its partnership with the US software giant.

Microsoft has worked with the Korean manufacturer to develop a secure solution aimed at B2B combining Office 365 and Samsung’s security platform KNOX.

The two firms announced at MWC that Samsung is pre-installing Microsoft OneNote, OneDrive, and Skype on its new Galaxy S6 and S6 edge flagships, which go on sale in the UK on April 10.

Extending the partnership, it will also add Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint to a select (and as yet unspecified) range of Android tablets.

“Great things happen when you converge services and devices,” said Microsoft executive VP of business development Peggy Johnson. “Our partnership with Samsung is emblematic of our efforts to bring the best of Microsoft’s productivity services to everyone, on every device – so people can be productive wherever, however and whenever they want.”

Businesses that purchase devices directly through Samsung’s B2B sales channel will have access to three Office 365 products: Business, Business Premium and Enterprise. These will all be coupled with Samsung KNOX.

“Our goal is to meet the ever-evolving needs of both consumers and business customers and give them more power to discover new mobile experiences,” Samsung IT and mobile executive VP of strategic marketing SangChul Lee said.

“We believe our suite of premium mobile products coupled with Microsoft’s productivity services will offer users the mobility they need in both their personal and business life.”

BlackBerry will launch a cloud-based version of its device management platform BES 12 later this month, it announced at an event at Mobile World Congress.

The Canadian manufacturer has recently moved more into mobile device management by offering its BES 12 platform to users of Android, iOS and Windows Devices, announced its new Enterprise Mobility Management solution in Barcelona today (March 2).

BES12 Cloud aims to offer small and medium sized businesses more flexible access to secure device on their own networks. It will support Bring Your Own Device and Corporate-Owned Personally enabled devices.

“BlackBerry always commits to deliver secure and innovative products to help our customers drive productivity and efficiency in their organisations, while reducing costs,” said BlackBerry executive vice president for enterprise products and value-add solutions Billy Ho.

“Close relationships with our customers and partners is why we have announced our commitment to delivering a new BES12 Cloud solution later this month and delivered enhancements to BES12 and BBM Meetings today, continuing the expansion and evolution of our offering.”

Knox integration

The new cross-platform device management software is part of a wider update to BES12 that includes additional security protocols for government use, enhanced Android management including support for Samsung’s security platform Knox and additions to the administrator functions on the device.

The Canadian firm has also updated BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) to include a Microsoft Outlook plugin that allows synchronisation between BBM Meetings and the Outlook calendar. 

BlackBerry has also upped the encryption levels on BBM to extend the security of BBM Protected conversations to non-BBM Protected users. This means that all conversations initiated by a user with BBM Protect can be secured.

BBM users can also personalise the messaging app with new customisable options announced at MWC. These included the ability to come up with a customisable PIN, which BlackBerry said was one of the most requested features from BBM users. These cost $1.99 per month from the BB store.

Android Wear also now supports BBM, meaning the messenger app will be available on a range of wearables. Smart watch owners will be able to receive alerts when a new BBM comes in, read messages in their entirety, and respond to them using Google Now.

BlackBerry also announced new BlackBerry Partner applications were being made available for BlackBerry 10, iOS and Android devices focused on the healthcare sector.

BlackBerry has announced a partnership with Samsung that will see its BES 12 enterprise mobility management suite integrated into Samsung’s Knox security software.

The announcement was made at the launch of BES 12 in San Francisco yesterday evening with BlackBerry chief executive officer claiming the new partnership was “just the tip of the iceberg”.

The integrated product will be available for Android users from early 2015. BES 12 will allow enterprises to securely manage corporate apps and content on both BlackBerry devices and software, as we as iOS, Windows and Android handsets.

“Our Enterprise Portfolio, with BES12 at its foundation, does so much more than just manage cross-platform devices. Amongst many other capabilities, the portfolio provides easy and safe access to corporate data, manages an array of employee IDs, and offers new ways to securely and conveniently collaborate with colleagues,” said BlackBerry global enterprise services president John Sims.

Prices for a subscription to BES 12 start at $23 (£14.66) per device, per year, rising to a maximum of $90 (£57.38) per annum.

It also unveiled a new voice and video conferencing app (BlackBerry Meetings) and software which allows firms to place a separate corporate number on employee’s personal devices. The latter, is the first BlackBerry-branded product following its acquisition of British software company, Movirtu, earlier this year.

Google and Samsung are attempting to make Android a more secure platform for enterprise after tying up a deal to integrate Samsung Knox into the next version of the OS.

Knox, was released by Samsung in 2013, and creates a container that seperates personal and enterprise data on Samsung devices such as he S3, S4, S5 and Note 3. It will be available through Android L which was announced at Google’s I/O conference on last night (June 25^th) and will be released later this year.

Samsung say it is available on more 20 of their products including a select number of tablets such as the Tab Pro range. Enterprise data on the device can be securely locked and remotely wiped by an enterprise’s IT team.

It has recently received accreditation from departments of the UK and US government and is helping to bring confidence to Android as an enterprise platform.

At an event in London (pictured) earlier today (June 26^th), Samsung explained that Android’s B2B market share was around 20 per cent, compared to its over 70 per cent share of the consumer space. Security has been a key issue in the lack of uptake.

Knox was previously only available to Samsung users but the manufacturer says its hardware means that it will still have a huge point of differentiation, from other Android players when it comes to security.

“Inherently, we’re device manufacturers, so we have control of the chip set and the processor and we have some patents around how we look at the binary, the boot and the platform level security we provide for Samsung Knox,” Samsung strategic marketing office, mobile comm. Jae H. Shin told Mobile News.

“What we are giving to Android is the container technology and how to separate data between personal and business.

“We’re not holding anything back but by nature what we have control over is the hardware and what they have control over is the operating system Anything that has to do with the OS, we’re handing over.

Shin also told Mobile News that no money was exchanging hands as part of the deal and that roll out plans, had not been formalised. “This is open source. How Google is going to actually roll this out hasn’t been determined or announced yet, we’re still waiting for how they’re going to that.

“To other manufacturers they don’t have to go through the pain of researching and developing, the investments that they need to make actually becomes part of the OS. For us, its great because now we have the entire Android eco-system unified under one enterprise story.”