Read through the rest of the press release and you'll see that Verizon is partnering with Quickcomm (for the expense management piece), Vodafone (for logistics), Sybase (for device management and security) and a player to be named later (sounds like a draft pick) for application management.
On the one hand, I applaud what Verizon is trying to do here. It's two big things (in the context of enterprise mobility).
- It's recognizing an opportunity to provide its customer base more services (kinda sorta sounds like ARPU) so that they remain more sticky (kinda sorta sounds like less churn); and
- Is one of the best ways the company can make the case that it (and other carriers) are more than just a pipe for voice and data services.
Organizations need these kinds of services, and there's an increasing demand from companies for "one throat to choke," meaning when they have questions or problems with their mobility solutions, they only need to make one phone call and not get bounced around a whole suite of vendors. My question is, is the carrier the company that companies will look to for help with their mobility management solutions? A couple of quick points:
- First and foremost, I have strong reservations regarding a company looking to a carrier to help it optimize its wireless expenses. Frankly, that's like having the fox in the hen house. There's also the possibility that the carrier would then have an ulterior motive to make employees switch from a competing carrier to their own service. Now I am not suggesting AT ALL that this is Verizon's intention (I actually know otherwise), but perception is reality, and no matter who Verizon had partnered with, they are going to have an uphill battle to prove altruistic, customer centric agnosticism. (Couldn't I have just said "do right by the client?")
- So let's be clear, the application management part is technically a misnomer. It's more about application development. So who will they partner with? Antenna? Spring? Pyxis? I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
My biggest question is why did they decide to offer this via Verizon Wireless and Verizon Business as opposed to just Verizon Business. Had they gone with the latter approach, my sense is this would be a much stronger proposition. The cold, harsh, reality is that carriers are still struggling to provide value added services to the enterprise beyond voice and data plans. That doesn't mean they shouldn't try, but wouldn't it make sense to start with the services arm of your company? The key here (as with most things) will be execution. The Verizon sales team will need to be trained on the value propositions of each solution and will have to make sure they can provide a complete and pithy value proposition to clients and prospects. That's a lot easier said than done, especially when carrier sales people have historically (and traditionally) been comped on activations.
This also brings up the issue that Verizon will now be competing head-to-head with other management companies...you know, like Accenture, IBM, HP - small companies. Now mind you, in the grander scheme of things, this is a good thing. This raises the bar and visibility on the increasing importance of mobility management services which will ultimately become mobile outsourcing (that's a ways out though).
So all in all, some pretty interesting news coming over the wires today. I'm curious to see what the overall market reaction will be. What do you think? Is Verizon poised to become a leading provider of enterprise mobility management services?
