• silicon.com
• Management
• CIO Insights

By Michael Silver, 21 September 2009 15:03

COMMENT

silicon.com's CIO Jury doesn't expect IT departments to start buying Macs as a result of the launch of Apple's new Snow Leopard operating system. But in this exclusive article, in response to the CIO Jury findings, Michael Silver, research VP and distinguished analyst at Gartner argues that just because CIOs aren't buying Macs, that doesn't mean they won't appear on corporate networks.

Macs are appearing in more and more organisations. But this does not signal a major change in organisations' buying habits. In fact, while Apple is still popular in some niches in business, the IT department does not purchase or sanction many of the Macs that are gaining use in businesses. Instead, end users or businesses are buying them themselves.

End users want Macs for numerous reasons. Some have specific Mac-only software they need to run. Some like the industrial design and engineering of Apple hardware. Some insist the hardware and software work better than Windows machines. And some just think they look cool. But regardless of whether users select them for a real business reason or to showcase as jewellery, they are increasingly a platform IT must deal with to ensure they work with the corporate infrastructure.

Apple has made each new release of Mac OS X easier to integrate with corporate resources. With the arrival of Snow Leopard, Apple added perhaps the most important feature users need to participate on their corporate network - native support for Microsoft Exchange email to mail, calendar, and address book. This will likely lead to an increase in the number of Macs IT managers will find on their networks.

But does Exchange support in Snow Leopard mean that organisations are more likely to buy them? Gartner thinks not, for a number of reasons.

First, for many users, perhaps even most, the existence of native Exchange support in Snow Leopard is a non-issue. Many users continue to require Microsoft Office to do their work or collaborate with their peers.

Alternatives such as OpenOffice.org and Apple's iWork may be able to satisfy the casual user who needs to do some basic writing, spreadsheet, or presentation work. But these alternatives do not provide complete compatibility with Microsoft Office. Therefore, many Mac users buy and run Microsoft Office. The fact that the machines are likely to run Office means they will already have Exchange support without needing the new features from Apple.

Further, although the number of applications that require Windows is generally shrinking as more applications run in a browser or using other OS-neutral technologies, the huge number of Windows applications still in use and the slow rate at which organisations replace them mean that most users need to be able to run Windows applications. While products exist to run Windows applications on a Mac in a virtual machine or from a server, these add cost and complexity.

Lastly, Apple does not cater to the corporate market. It is much better for Apple to concentrate on its core consumer constituency without having to worry about building the features, service, and support that many businesses require.

This allows Apple to minimise complexity and respond more quickly to the needs of the consumer market, without having to address corporate demands, which may require different features, or even a slower delivery cycle. Apple is content to continue to make Mac OS more enterprise-friendly and continue to enter organisations through the "back door" so it can keep complexity down and not muddle its message with one to a business audience. Until Apple decides it wants or needs to provide the service and support capabilities that organisations need, its corporate audience will remain limited.

IT managers will continue to find more Macs on their networks and they will need to ensure they are secure and supportable. But for the most part, it is not IT that is buying them.