CONNECTIONS PLUS SEPT/OCT 2015

SeptEMBER/OCTOBER 2015

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SPOTLIGHT ON A CHANGING MOBILE WORLD

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Contents Fe a t u r e s

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18

Transformation of Work Ryerson study a must read

14 Cue The Mobile Enterprise

22

No stopping this juggernaut

10

Departments Editor’s Note Mobile Movements

4 6

New & Noteworthy

30

The Back Page

34

member of:

I n the N ext Issue

>> Structured Cabling:

audited by:

What Lies Ahead?

14 www.connectionsplus.ca

September/October 2015

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Digital, mobility and the

bottom line elcome to our second special mobility issue. In our cover story on Pizza Nova, president Domenic Primucci sums up what every CEO and senior executive must be or should be thinking about when it comes to overall strategy and the bottom line.

Today, he says, mobile, infrastructure, IP and integration are as much a part of management’s daily conversations as pizza toppings and inventory: “Sure, we’re a pizza company, but some days it feels like we have become an IT company and we’re just delivering pizza as a sidebar. The fact is in our industry we have to worry about the IT stuff. We need it to compete.”

Other observations in this issue you will find from the magazine’s team of writers and experts interviewed include the following: • Catherine Connelly, associate profession of Human Resources and Management and Canada Research Chair in Organizational Behaviour at McMaster University, says some companies struggle with going mobile because it changes how they manage employees. Some mobile employees also feel they are expected to be constantly available and that their work-life balance is thrown off kilter.

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Paul Welch reports in his article entitled “Transformation Of Work” that the adoption rate by Canadian business lags behind that of their global counterparts and in many cases, behind that of the business community’s own employees.

Dr. Wendy Cukier, vice president of research and innovation at Ryerson University and co-author of a major mobility study Welch writes about in the piece, states that “digital technologies have the potential to transform virtually every sector.”

Authors of the latest edition of the Ericsson Mobility Report predict that advanced mobile technology will be commonplace around the globe by 2020. Smartphone subscriptions will more than double reaching 6.1 billion, 70% of the world’s population will be using smartphones, and 90% will be covered by mobile broadband networks.

Sasha Puric, vice president of technology for Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment, says that the “expectations of fans, the expectations of communities to have a much more engaging experience in stadiums and arenas has pushed us to think about where are we going to take the next generation of fan experience.” An example of that is the newly renovated BMO Field in Toronto. “Today we are catering to 22,000 people who expect nothing less than a first-class wireless experience, which quite honestly, five or 10 years ago was impossible,” he says. “The technology just wasn’t there and the expectations of the fans to be able to log in and check their e-mail wasn’t that important. Today, though, fans are expecting to be catered to.”

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Volume 2, Issue 5 September/October 2015

SPOTLIGHT ON A CHANGING MOBILE WORLD

Editor Paul Barker 416-510-6752 pbarker@connectionsplus.ca Senior Publisher Maureen Levy 416-510-5111 mlevy@connectionsplus.ca Art Director Mary Peligra

President Alex Papanou Editorial Advisory Board Keith Fortune, CET, Western Regional Manager, Electron Metal AIG Inc. Henry Franc, RCDD/OSP Senior Account Manager, Professional Support at Belden

Production Manager Kim Collins Creative Advertising Services Mike Chimienti Circulation Manager Barbara Adelt 416-442-5600 ext. 3546 badelt@bizinfogroup.ca

Brantz Myers, B.Sc Math and Computing Science Director of Healthcare Business Development, Cisco Systems Canada Co. Peter Sharp, RCDD, AMIEE Senior Telecommunications Consultant, Giffels Associates Limited/IBI Group

Print Production Manager Phyllis Wright

Alex Smith, President, Connectivitywerx

Advertising Sales Maureen Levy 416-510-5111 mlevy@connectionsplus.ca www.connectionsplus.ca

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We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Periodical Fund of the Department of Canadian Heritage.

Canada Subscriptions Canada, 1 year $44.95 + taxes (HST #815380985-RT0001). United States U.S. $46.95. Foreign U.S. $73.95. Single copy in Canada $8, in USA $10 US, elsewhere $10 US. Printed in Canada All rights reserved. The contents of this publication may not be reproduced either in part or in full without the consent of the copyright owner(s).

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Mo b i l e Mo v e m e n t s

Intel’s Young deliberates on changing security model The need to secure mobile devices is now paramount.

By Paul Barker During a recent presentation to a group of Toronto area executives, Chris Young, head of Intel Security, talked about the need to be cognizant when it comes to handling the threat of a cyber attack.

Young, who formerly served as senior vice president of Cisco’s Security Business Group, oversees a US$3 billion a year business for Intel that includes McAfee, which the company acquired four years ago, believes the key is having a security strateChris Young gy that keeps up with the modern times. In other words, organizations need to be proactive.

“We have always had the dual challenge of keeping up with the changing IT landscape,” he said during an interview with Connections+.

“As we move to the cloud, as we become mobile, as we connect more devices, the security model has to keep up with all of that. And then we have the added challenge of dealing with the sophistication level and changes in the attack landscape as well.”

That landscape includes what he described as an “exponential growth” in the “number and type and diversity of devices that are connected.”

Tablets and mobile devices, added Young, can be viewed as an extension of the old PC days, but today there is a huge diversity in the types of devices and applications that are connected to the Internet or IP-enabled that did not exist five years ago.

“That does create a lot of pressure from an IT security perspective, but it is something that we are working our way through as an industry, whether that be new products, new services, new types of expertise and training, but it does require a lot of focus.”

Young, who held senior roles at VMware and RSA as well as co-founding Cyveillance Inc. prior to joining Cisco, said that while the role of the network is important, it does not stop there when it comes to having a sound security strategy. There will, he added, be more innovation at the device level and equally as important, also in the cloud.

“In 2011, you would have had a lot of CIOs saying we are not going to go to the cloud – there are too many security issues. Fast forward to 2014, every CIO is saying, ‘we are going to go to the cloud even though most of the fundamental security challenges hadn’t 6

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been solved. They just changed their perspective, ultimately because users were going there and they couldn’t stop the wave and the productivity improvements and the flexibility of cloud-based applications.

“That being said, the innovation for security has shifted there as well. In the last five years, we have had over 1,200 new startups in the security space, over US$7 billion in capital, all the big players like Intel are in the game as well.

“There is a tremendous amount of investment going on in the security space and a lot of it is going to cloud, it is going to SaaS and identifying new types of threats.

While there has been a push to move to more connected devices, more cloud services etc., the security investment and a lot of security innovation is following quickly.”

Meanwhile, on Sept. 1, Intel Security released its latest McAfee Labs Threat Report, which includes a critique of graphics processing unit (GPU) malware claims, an investigation of the top cybercriminal exfiltration techniques, and a five-year retrospective on the evolution of the threat landscape since Intel’s announcement of the McAfee acquisition.

The five-year threat landscape analysis suggests: • Increasingly evasive malware and long-running attacks were not surprising, but some of the specific tactics and techniques were unimagined five years ago.

• Although the volume of mobile devices has increased even faster than expected, serious broad-based attacks on those devices have grown much more slowly than originally thought.

• Attacks and breaches against IoT devices have just begun.

• Cloud adoption has changed the nature of some attacks, as devices are attacked not for the small amount of data that they store, but as a path to where the important data resides.

• Cybercrime has grown into a full-fledged industry with suppliers, markets, service providers, financing, trading systems, and a proliferation of business models.

• Businesses and consumers still do not pay sufficient attention to updates, patches, password security, security alerts, default configurations, and other easy but critical ways to secure cyber and physical assets.

• The discovery and exploitation of core Internet vulnerabilities has demonstrated how some foundational technologies are underfunded and understaffed.

• There is growing, positive collaboration between the security industry, academia, law enforcement, and governments to take down cybercriminal operations. www.connectionsplus.ca

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Mo b i l e Mo v e m e n t s

President of Ericsson Canada peers into the future Existing mobile networks simply will not cut it, Henderson tells Canadian Telecom Summit audience.

By Paul Barker

Findings from the latest edition of the Ericsson Mobility Report represent a true indication that today’s mobile networks will need to be upgraded and overhauled, says Mark Henderson, the president of Ericsson Canada.

Three days before the release of the company’s annual report in June, Henderson delivered a speech at the Canadian Telecom Summit in which he talked about the onset of a mobile transformation that will place “new requireMark Henderson ments on connectivity and set the scene for next-generation wireless access 5G.” Ericsson is predicting a virtual video and data explosion.

According to the report, by 2020 advanced mobile technology will be commonplace around the globe: smartphone subscriptions will more than double, reaching 6.1 billion, 70% of the world’s population will be using smartphones, and 90% will be covered by mobile broadband networks.

In addition, mobile video traffic is predicted to grow by 55% annually and will constitute around 60% of all mobile data traffic by 2020.

Rima Qureshi, Ericsson’s chief strategy officer, said “this immense growth in advanced mobile technology and data usage, driven by a surge in mobile connectivity and smartphone uptake, will make today’s big data revolution feel like the arrival of a floppy disk.

“We see the potential for mass-scale transformation, bringing a wealth of opportunities for telecom operators and others to capture new revenue streams. But it also requires greater focus on cost efficient delivery and openness to new business models to compete and remain effective.”

All of this activity, said Henderson, continues to create a lot of pressure on the technology, adding that over the past 10 years “we have seen tremendous expansion from a technological point of view. UMTS networks were introduced in 2004 with speeds of 384 kilobits, which were considered lightening fast at the time.

“Then came HSDA, 3G Multi-Carrier, the introduction of 4G or LTE technology, which is widely deployed across North America 8

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5G networks will be highly scalable and programmable in terms of speeds, capacity, security, reliability, availability and impact on battery life.

”

today. And now, with the advent of LTE Advanced technology with carrier aggregation, we are now seeing speeds of 450 megabits per second. That is almost 1,200 times faster than the speed introduced in 2004. We can not stop here. We are well on the path to realizing the 5G milestone over the next five years.”

Networks built for smaller volumes, he added, will not be able to handle and cope with these new demands.

“This transformation sets the scene for next-generation wireless access 5G networks. They will be highly scalable and programmable in terms of speeds, capacity, security, reliability, availability and impact on battery life. Traditional networks with their one size fits all approach need to be adapted so that they can accommodate the thousands of use cases and many different subscriber types.”

Examples of the forthcoming applications include mass market personalized television, transport systems that “will allow you to see through the car in front of you and decide whether it’s safe to pass or not, M2M systems that allow an app to control heavy machinery instead of a human and sensors that can be buried in the road.

“The sensors would be able to report on traffic volumes, congestion, temperature and road damage,” Henderson said. “The sensors themselves also need to be able to survive for years without a battery change.”

The authors of the Mobility Report say an expanding range of applications and business models coupled with “falling modem modem costs are key factors driving the growth of connected devices,” the report stated. Added to this, “new use cases are emerging for both short and long range applications, leading to even stronger growth of connected devices moving forward.”

Ericsson’s forecast, outlined in the report, points to 26 billion connected devices by 2020. Earlier predictions by the company forecast 50 billion connected devices. www.connectionsplus.ca

M o bile Movemen ts

2Q2015: LTE connections worldwide doubled to 750M+, new report finds

4G Americas reports that LTE continues to rapidly accelerate with nearly 755 million total connections worldwide as of the second quarter of 2015; a 141% increase year-over-year according to Ovum research.

North America continues to lead the world by increasing its high ranking in LTE market share to 47.5% compared to the rising global market share for LTE of 10%. Latin America boasted the highest growth rate of LTE connections among the world regions with an impressive 32% growth increase year-over-year.

“North America continued its tremendous leadership in LTE with metrics such as coverage, share of market and penetration,” said Chris Pearson, president of 4G Americas. “Network operators in the region continue to expand and upgrade their LTE and LTE-Advanced networks, including deployment of VoLTE, carrier aggregation and other important enhancements.”

LTE has a 47.5% share of market within all mobile wireless connections in North America. This compares to the next highest ranking regions, Western Europe at 19% and Oceania, Eastern and South-Eastern Asia at 16.25%. Penetration of LTE in North America increased to 55% compared to Western Europe at 24% and Oceania, Eastern and South-Eastern Asia at 17% (penetration represents the number of LTE connections as a percentage of the population). North America exceeds all other world regions.

LTE-Advanced is now being deployed across operators’ footprints in North America, offering performance and capacity improvements.

The study revealed: • 198 million LTE connections as of June 2015; net gain of 65 million new LTE subscribers during the last 12 months.

• LTE connections are forecast to reach 206 million by year-end 2015 and nearly 400 million by year-end 2020.

• LTE connections more than doubled from 314 million in June 2014 adding 441 million new subscriptions and growth of 141% worldwide in 12 months ending in June 2015. LTE has been commercialized on 425 networks across 145 countries today. Operators are beginning to evolve to LTE-Advanced which is already commercialized on 88 networks in 45 countries across the globe. The number of LTE-Adwww.connectionsplus.ca

vanced networks increased by 21 networks in the last quarter alone, so indications are that enhancements such as carrier aggregation are being sought by operators around the world.

“The industry is focusing a lot of time and energy on 5G,” added Pearson. “However, LTE is the fastest growing mobile broadband technology on record and is expected to reach 3.6 billion connections worldwide by 2020 when 5G is expected to be launched.”

The study also found that there are: • 425 commercial LTE networks today in 145 countries • 517 million LTE connections at the end of 2014; 775 million as of June 2015 • 88 LTE-Advanced commercial networks in 45 countries • LTE connections are forecast to reach nearly 1 billion at the end of this year, 3 billion by year-end 2019 and 3.6 billion by year-end 2020 when LTE surpasses the number of HSPA connections 4G Americas maintains a current list of LTE Deployments in the Americas and LTE-Advanced Global Deployments on its Web site.

For more information and to view a variety of statistical charts on the 3GPP family of technologies, visit www.4gamericas.org. All subscriber and forecast data is from Ovum.

Telus goes global with new IoT platform In today’s hyper-connected world, businesses are increasingly facing the need to connect assets, vehicles and devices across multiple countries – and even continents. To that end, Telus said recently it is making it easier for its customers to scale their Internet of Things (IoT) businesses globally with the introduction of the Telus Global IoT Connectivity Platform.

The company has joined forces with a network of 70+ carriers to offer a global SIM card that it said “delivers seamless connectivity and simplified billing” across more than 200 networks around the world.

“As Canadian businesses expand into new markets, they are faced with negotiating contracts in different languages, managing their connectivity on multiple platforms and paying bills in foreign currencies to keep their IoT devices connected,” said Shawn Sanderson, Telus vice president of the Internet of Things. “By working with an extensive ecosystem of carriers around the world, we’re making it simple for our customers and IoT partners to stay connected ...”

Telus said its platform connects Internet-enabled devices around the world at simplified rates without roaming charges or currency risk. For example, a shipping company with a fleet tracking system can continue to monitor its vehicles when they travel to the U.S., Mexico and beyond without swapping out SIM cards, worrying about connectivity or encountering billing surprises, the firm added.

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Transformation

of Work A recent study has found that when it comes to mobile technology, Canadians businesses still lag behind their global counterparts.

By Paul Welch 10

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ffice Interiors recognized it was time to join in on the growing global embrace of mobile technology. The Halifaxbased supplier of office products relies heavily on its own mobile workforce: the technicians who are on the road constantly, installing, maintaining and servicing its variety of office equipment.

So it made sense to incorporate the technology that would make that vital cog in its system more productive and efficient, says Keith Skiffington, the firm’s chief operating officer.

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The lack of mobile technology adoption is a major business issue that, if left ignored, could have a major impact on productivity and competitiveness for Canadian companies.

While it had been introducing mobile technology into its business model for the past decade, the company has increased its usage significantly over the past four years. And it has paid off: Its productivity has increased significantly.

Office Interiors is; however, not the standard for Canadian businesses it appears. Indeed, a recently-released study by Ryerson University has found that many are lagging behind their global counterparts in the use of mobile technology.

The study, Transformation of Work, notes “that in spite of the potential benefits, many Canadian organizations lack the capacity for adoption. Only half of managers (50%) surveyed had clearly integrated mobile technologies into their business strategy.

“The lack of mobile technology adoption is a major business issue that, if left ignored, could have a major impact on productivity and competitiveness for Canadian companies.”

The study, first-of-its-kind national research conducted by researchers at Ryerson University and supported by Rogers and Mitacs, was released at the annual Canadian Telecom Summit in Toronto in June.

It examines the role of mobile technologies and adoption rates in the Canadian workplace and contends that new technologies, including wireless and mobile devices, improved network infrastructure, Web-based collaboration tools, machine-to-machine (M2M), pervasive and scalable cloud-based IT solutions, as well as analytics and applications, can generate improvements in productivity, development of new products and services and produce more engaged employees and customers.

However, the adoption rate by Canadian business lags behind that of global counterparts and the country’s general population -– and in many cases, behind that of the business community’s own employees.

The study echoes findings from other reports that suggest that a disjointed approach to managing technologies in Canadian organizations is limiting adoption and impeding productivity and innovation.

“Digital technologies have the potential to transform virtually every sector,” Dr. Wendy Cukier, vice president of research and innovation at Ryerson and co-author of the study, notes in the report.

“There is ample evidence that under-investments in technology are impeding growth and productivity improvements. A strategic approach supported by management and operational policies, measurement and a culture embracing innovation are essential.

Creating something new does not produce innovation unless it is actually adopted.”

In a separate interview, Cukier told Connections+ she prefers to consider the study a wake-up call rather than an alarm bell. There www.connectionsplus.ca

are myriad examples of companies that are increasing their use of mobile/wireless technology, she says. But there is ample room for improvement.

“Only 40% of small- to mediumsized businesses even have a Web site or a Web presence,” she notes.

The study found a variety of reasons for the reluctant pace among Canadian businesses (for the full report, visit http://rc4.ryerson.ca/transformation-ofwork/), but noted the two prime considerations were cost and security.

Cukier acknowledges that both are legitimate concerns, but she stresses that they should not bring progress to a standstill, since those impediments can be addressed.

For instance, the report cites several examples of companies that offset the investment costs with dramatic, lucrative increases in productivity attributable in large measure to the adoption of a mobile technology strategy Skiffington says Office Interiors’ significant increase in mobile technology investment in the past four years was certainly spurred by a corresponding reduction in telecom costs to manageable levels, and the gains have been impressive.

The company is part of a North American productivity group that measures individual company performance against similar businesses. Office Interiors habitually scores at or above recommended performance levels; an achievement that Skiffington credits in no small part to its increased affinity for mobile technology.

“It’s a no-brainer now,” he says.

The report cites multiple examples of businesses that successfully reduced operating costs after they increased their reliance on mobile technology, including Deloitte, which is “in the process of a substantial physical restructuring of their workplace in the Greater Toronto Area, consolidating several buildings into one downtown building.

This physical shift is facilitated by increased mobile flexibility, and Deloitte representatives indicated that gains in productivity are a key driver.”

A key finding in the report shows that businesses are just starting to understand and manage the opportunities that mobile technology provides, but need help to develop management processes that drive value.

It also notes; however, that while researchers preparing the Transformation report were able to find examples of companies such as Deloitte and Office Interiors – and many others – that have demonstrable benefits to show from increased adoption of

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mobile technology, there is not much public information available to business that definitely shows a strong enough return on investment to justify the cost of investment.

It is a gap that the mobile technology industry should address, Cukier says. “There is much focus on the bits and bytes, but not enough on the impact of investing,” she says. “It would help to raise awareness and help businesses make better decisions.”

The decision factor is a critical one. While many companies are prepared to make the investment, they are unsure how to best go about it. Cukier notes there are consultants and even some government programs available to help companies examine their structures and determine the wisest and most fiscally responsible way to embrace the mobile technology growth.

Indeed, she says many companies probably already have – but have overlooked – a valuable commodity within their ranks to further that end: the younger generation already working for them; a generation that has grown up with daily doses of this very same technology, which is as natural to them as it is daunting for so many of the older, senior-level-executive decision-makers whose skill sets are honed on the business, rather than technology, side.

“Companies would do well to leverage the talent and energy of their young people,” Cukier says. “They’re bright, they’re not scared of technology.”

Leaning on the talents of younger, capable employees provides more than just a handy resource, she notes; it also serves as a clear show of trust and support from the management side, and provides the younger generation with added engagement in the workplace.

Skiffington concurs that senior-level managers, who are typically a generation or two older than the junior, tech-savvy employees, need to recognize the value they can bring. “You have to be open to new ideas. If you keep yourself inside those (traditional models) you limit your growth. You need to weigh the business side .... but you need to keep abreast or risk losing out.”

While the cost of mobile technology implementation has slowed investment, the report says, so, too, have the concerns about internal security. “If you are used to a closed system and it is opened up to mobile, you are definitely creating more vulnerability,” Cukier says. “These are challenges; they are not insurmountable, but they do require attention. These are legitimate concerns but not an excuse for doing nothing.”

Additional impediments cited by surveyed businesses include integration with legacy systems and the policies, processes and talent required to implement them effectively.

As for the report itself, other key findings included: • Mobile technology adoption is important and growing among 12

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Canadian businesses.

• Almost all (96%) of companies are using mobile technologies. Canada has a higher rate of smartphone adoption than the U.S., yet is behind in the adoption of mobile apps in the workplace.

• 70% of Canadian employees are mobile in some way (physically) and this is expected to increase to 73% by 2016.

• The Information and Communications Technology Council (ICTC) estimates that every 1% increase in mobile technology adoption will lead to 0.08% of GDP growth.

• Mobile technology is clearly impacting and transforming the Canadian work environment. It is also improving access to information and changing the definition of the workplace.

• The workforce is becoming more mobile and workers increasingly expect flexibility and support for their use of technology.

• Organizations reported improvements in effectiveness, collaboration and access to information.

• Fewer than 30% of organizations see a clear value proposition for the technology.

• Half of managers reported more research is needed on impacts and metrics.

• The adoption of mobile technologies is being driven by a number of factors, but understanding and measuring the value remains elusive: • Change is coming from both the needs of management and the demands of employees.

• There is an unclear return on investment (ROI) for mobile adoption.

• Businesses do not completely understand the potential of the technology as it applies to their workplace – less than 30% of companies saw a clear value proposition for the new technology.

For Canadian companies to reap the full benefits of mobile technologies, Cukier notes in the report, “Canada is preoccupied with the innovation gap and most of our attention has been focused on supporting entrepreneurs and startups that commercialize and develop new technologies and processes – the supply side.

“Unless these new technologies are actually used, there is no innovation.

“We need additional focus on understanding the human, organizational and policy issues that affect the demand and adoption of these technologies to drive productivity improvements and global competitiveness.”

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Paul Welch is a freelance writer based in Midland, Ont. He can be reached at welch2096@rogers.com. www.connectionsplus.ca

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FE ATU R E

Cue The

Mobile Enterprise Era While security remains an issue, there is no stopping this technology juggernaut.

By Ian Harvey

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he mobile universe is unfolding perfectly as a perfect storm of devices, security options, wireless network capacity and changing user aptitude combine.

It’s also a case of perfect timing as the Millennials assert their culture in the working world, underlining their philosophy that work is a thing, not a place, blurring the lines.

There are challenges; however, as Dan Klimke, product marketing manager at Netscout Fluke Networks, a provider of network management for carrier and enterprise customers notes: “From a technology standpoint all those components seem to be there and seem to be right paced, and there’s a promise of high performance,

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FEATURE

but one of the challenges our customers are still running into (revolve) around the network, even with refreshes.”

An example of that is Wireless LAN 802.11ac, which Klimke describes as not just an “evolution, but whole new ballgame.”

Indeed, 802.11ac, the fifth generation of Wi-Fi standards, boosts the number of access points available for each client and offers much more bandwidth, primarily to accommodate the demand for video.

The difference, he says, is previous upgrades didn’t have much impact on the wired networks. which ultimately carry the data, the backhaul.

With 802.11ac running at 500 Mbps, and with the trends towards more users with more connected devices connecting to the same network it can have an impact as users seek access to the company data centre and SaaS apps running off the Cloud.

“We’re only beginning to realize how prevalent and pervasive this technology can be,” he says. “We see HVAC systems, building sensors, even our vending machine is hooked up to the network. It’s all part of the Internet of Things.”

The issue is QoS – Quality of Service – so real time apps such as VoIP which are sensitive to lag are prioritized,” he said.

Breakdown of QoS is a major point of friction and conflict between IT and the business users, with fingers getting pointed at vendors, networks providers, IT policies and of course the IT managers themselves, regardless of whether they are internal or outsourced.

Security is the other challenge. Last summer a drone mounted with a Wi-Fi access point was flown to the top of an office building where it spoofed an Access Point and lured users into connecting their devices, gathering the data it needs to access the real Wi-Fi network.

A 2014 study by BlackBerry found 70% of risk managers fingered mobile devices as their employers biggest risk. More worrying was that only 30% of those surveyed thought security measures were “adequate.”

Of course, security is Blackberry’s trump card. The Bring-YourOwn-Device (BYOD) trend notwithstanding, some companies are sticking with Blackberry because it is still the gold standard in security, notes Neil Bhattacharya, principal director at Accenture Canada.

Generally; however, despite their size and sophistication, many enterprises have not thought deeply about the impact of mobile devices on their network. www.connectionsplus.ca

Some of the issues in not updating networks are around the cost of replacing legacy systems “To get around this you can either lock everyone in using only a small sub-set of applications on mobiles, where every app is certified or in such a way that when you click the icon it activates a VPN tunnel inside the network,” says Bhattaharya. “At that point the network can trust the device and the app, but it’s very limiting because of the time to log in, get a password. It can take a minute to get access.”

The other way of dealing with legacy issues is to look at the data itself, he adds.

“We can look at data as A, B, or C either as public data, which doesn’t need to be encrypted, sensitive data which requires some protection or highly proprietary data which would cause problems if it were to fall into the wrong hands,” he says, noting the level of encryption and security escalate proportionately with the type of data.

“In our work we routinely use protected data, A, B and C.” The level of investment in mobility is also proportionate to its relationship with the business model: “If you’re a logistics company, delivering packages, then it is essential. You can’t operate if it goes down,” says Bhattacharya.

For other businesses, the option of mobility isn’t always obvious, but it can pay off big.

“We worked with a manufacturer of hair care products who was spending millions on glossy marketing publications,” he says. “We September/October 2015

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made an iPad application, which not only had the catalogue, but videos. They broke even right away but also found they were selling products to clients who hadn’t paid their bills.

So they were able to tell their sales force to check whether the client was paid up using the tab app.”

Still, security remains top of mind. Rolling out a couple thousand tablets to a work force only increases the risk one of them may get compromised.

“What you need is MDM – Mobile Device Management,” says Battacharya. MDM works in tandem with an app certificate assigned to each device which tells the MDM software it’s a device owned by a specific company. Any deviation from the set parameters results in an alert so if the device is cloned or the app is launched from a different device an alert is issued.

Similarly Mobile Application Management – MAM – works in parallel to lock down devices and app though the trend is to combine the two since enabling mobility is fast gaining traction for enterprises large and small.

“It’s not just for the big enterprises,” said Matt Leppanen, director of product management at Primus. “You see it in small verticals, contractors and the like with no offices. At the most you might just have someone picking up calls from the main line.”

Still, many businesses still need offices and physical locations and it often comes down to what individual users need, he adds.

“For the CEO it’s a seamless connection to the enterprise when they are on the road, at home or even the cottage” says Leppanen.

“Some want to replicate their office experience with them where ever they go. Others just want the phone to ring through wherever they are to give an office presence.”

Not all employees need the same communication tools, he adds, so the decision is less about the device and more about individual needs, tailoring the tools to the job.

“Part of this is that BYOD has exploded and morphed into bring your own way of working,” says Leppanen. “Mobility isn’t just working outside the office, it’s about how you work inside the office too.

You’re not just sitting at a desk, your in meetings in different parts of the business.”

Zia Mansoor, Microsoft’s national director of Cloud platform Azure, agrees there is a much broader definition at play and more parts to the puzzle especially around security.

“We see it really as managing identity, especially with all the consumer BYODs,” he says. “Regardless of whether you’re accessing Cloud apps like Microsoft Office 365 or Salesforce, it’s about maintaining control of access and that comes down to identity.”

In a study last year, he said, Verizon found 75% of corporate se-

”

curity breaches tracked back to weak or compromised user IDs. Microsoft’s focus is to use its Active Directory experience and extend into the Cloud with Azure.

“We take malware data from 1 billion PCs every month and use that to help our customers,” says Mansoor. “There’s a layer of intelligence and machine learning applied so if I log on in Toronto at 4 p.m. and then the same OD logs on in Vancouver at 4.30 p.m. the system knows something it wrong.”

Finally, there’s one aspect of a mobile enterprise which is often overlooked: The wetware, aka, the human component.

Catherine Connelly associate professor of Human Resources and Management and Canada Research Chair in Organizational Behaviour at McMaster University, says some companies struggle with going mobile because it changes how they manage employees.

On the other hand, some employees struggle with being cast out from the office where they fear they will be “out of sight out of mind” when it comes to career advancing assignments.

Some miss the social aspect of working collaboratively face to face, while some are extroverts and feel energized interacting around the office whereas introverts may find being mobile better suits their personalities.

Where the issues occur, she says, is in how the organization manages their employees, not so much the technology itself.

“The devil is in the details,” says Connelly, pointing to how Yahoo famously cancelled its work-at-home program two years ago saying it was not productive. “But others have telecommuting programs which work well and it really comes down to the managers and the employees who often like the autonomy.”

Still, some mobile employees also feel they are expected to be constantly available and that their work-life balance is thrown off kilter.

“People do need to turn it off for their emotional well-being,” she says, noting that having management protocols in place is essential in managing a mobile workforce.

“Companies need to have a good HR policies around confidentialities, ensuring employees don’t log on using coffee shop Wi-Fis, not leaving devices or USBs around unencrypted,” says Connelly.

We’re only beginning

to realize how prevalent and pervasive this

technology can be. We

see HVAC systems,

building sensors, even our vending machine is hooked up to the

network. It’s all part of

the Internet of Things.

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Ian Harvey is a Toronto-based freelance writer.

He can be reached at iharvey@rogers.com www.connectionsplus.ca

Our new website is a game-changer

COV E R S T ORY

Pizza Nova ups its technology game Mobile, infrastructure, IP and integration are as much a part of management’s daily conversations as toppings and inventory.

By Denise Deveau Photos courtesy of Pizza Nova

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COVER STORY

The latest pilot project is equipping district

omewhere along the way, Domenic Primucci became a technology expert.

At least that’s what the president of Pizza Nova says when discussing the company’s technology evolution over the past three-plus decades.

Today, mobile, infrastructure, IP and integration are as much a part of management’s daily conversations as pizza toppings and inventory, he says. “Sure, we’re a pizza company, but some days it feels like we’ve become an IT company and we’re just delivering pizza as a sidebar. The fact is, in our industry we have to worry about the IT stuff. We need it to compete.”

In reminiscing about the technology milestones that have happened along the way, Primucci hearkens back to the first “breakthrough” in the mid-1980s when the company went to a one phone number system and developed a call centre.

“Besides having some computers at work, centralizing ordering was our first real foray into technology.” As demand grew, the next transition was to VoIP in the early 2000s and a significant infrastructure change along with it.

While the firm’s Web site came into being in the late 1990s, it wasn’t until the early to mid-2000s that they were able to perfect the online ordering part of the system, Primucci notes. “That took time to develop because we were still in our infancy stage with the Web site. In our world the phone was always the preferred method of ordering so it took time for people to start to learn and embrace an online system.”

What tipped the scales into a full-scale IT strategizing was the advent of mobile for everything from payment systems and ordering apps to in-store POS (point of sale) and district management functions. “A key element of the mobile transition was the fact that all three order systems -- phone, online and the mobile app -- had to be integrated into a single whole. That meant a lot of back end work,” Primucci says.

While order systems were being worked on, Pizza Nova was also venturing into wireless POS systems for delivery personnel. “That helped a lot because it not only helps us be PCI- compliant, we don’t’ have to take credit card numbers anymore. Drivers simply take the payment terminal to the door,” he explains.

Primucci admits that the early stages of wireless payment met some bumps along the way, largely because of cellular coverage limitations. “At the beginning stages there were issues with coverage and we couldn’t rely 100% on cellular signals. Terminals didn’t work in some areas. Over time; however, technology has improved and we run into those issues less and less.”

With a robust, fully integrated network in place, the technology evolution has been moving along much more smoothly, and at a more rapid pace than ever, Primucci reports. Initiatives include centraliz-

S

ing all in-store POS system data, as well as sales and inventory reporting. “We’re able to abstract that information instantly rather than waiting for a franchisee to fill in the report and send it. In that way we can figure out variances in inventory and sales figures much quicker.”

In addition, Pizza Nova has connected its in-store POS systems with its distribution centre, eliminating the need to call in supply orders. Drivers also log into the POS terminals when picking up orders at the store so call centre personnel can immediately inform a customer calling in to check on their order.

“The call centre knows instantly when an order has left the store,” Primucci says.

The latest pilot project is equipping district managers with iPads to manage reporting and communications between stores and head office. “The iPad has become the tool for district managers to look to for items that need attention,” Primucci explains. “It makes follow up a lot easier.”

Each store is also being equipped with iPads for franchisees to access information specific to their locations, he adds. “They can go online, find out what the district managers said that day, and look at the dashboard to see how things are going. There’s lots of information in this type of tool.”

Primucci says they are also in the process of rolling out online staff training modules on the iPads. “While this doesn’t’ replace experiential training, it helps franchisees make sure staff get through the training they need to. We’re just rolling out modules now on topics like kitchens, customer service, delivery driving, etc.”

Getting on the IT bandwagon is something that Primucci says anyone in the QSR (quick service restaurant) sector needs to do to stay competitive. In fact, even in an industry where phone orders are still the go-to method of choice, he estimates that 20% of orders are now via mobile or online; and fully expects that percentage to grow in due time.

As the name quick service implies, Pizza Nova competes in an industry that can’t afford to make mistakes on the technology front, Primucci says. “In our business every customer expects their food in 35 to 40 minutes, so everything around the customer interface has to work properly or we could lose them.”

Pizza Nova is not alone in its forward thinking efforts. QSR and in particular pizza chains have been among the pioneers in adoption in technology, particularly on the mobile side, says Jackie Dulen Rodriguez, senior manager with Technomic Inc., a Chicago-based foodservice research and consulting firm.

“Overall mobile is a pretty dynamic area for the industry these days. We’re hearing lots of announcements about rollouts and test in every category within the foodservice segment. Pizza chain operators for example continue to devote a lot of their resources to improving the digital experience. Some are doing some fun experi-

managers with

iPads to manage

reporting and

communications

between stores

and head office.

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Pizza Nova has connected in-store POS systems with its distribution centre, eliminating the need to call in supply orders.

mental things such as enabling ordering by tweets or using voice recognition to order from a car.”

The obvious contributor is the pervasiveness of smartphones and the fact the all the equipment needed to engage a customer is sitting in their pockets, she says. An interesting phenomenon that goes with mobile ordering apps is that it often leads to an increased value in individual orders.

“Consumers aren’t embarrassed to indulge themselves ordering on a device whereas they might talking to a cashier. We’re also hearing a lot of discussion around geo-based marketing. Starbucks has an app for example that will tell you which store has the shortest lineup.”

Mobile isn’t just about the customer experience, she adds.

“We’re now seeing a lot of interest in what mobile technology can do beyond engaging with consumers. The resources needed to develop sophisticated mobile apps for example means you don’t necessarily need to outfit franchisees with hardware.”

Dulen Rodriguez says the next step for many is full integration between the front and back of the house operations.

“Most major chains are announcing rollouts for mobile ordering and payment. What we’re going to see on the horizon in terms of next-generation technology is tying capabilities such as ordering, loyalty programs and payment processing to mobile to create a closed loop. The chain for its part gets the rich data to understand what their customers are ordering, which stores they go to, what time, and how their stores are doing throughout the day so they can tailor their marketing efforts.”

Even on the back end, shifting to a mobile platform makes sense, she believes. “It gives managers the ability to be pretty much everywhere regardless of their physical location and communi20

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cate instantly with their restaurants. Inventory can also be tied to distributors and tracking of trucks.”

For now; however, tapping into the potential of mobile is something that has to be approached logically, Dulen Rodriguez advises. Typically that entails an initial launch in order to shed light on whether the operation is ready for a full-scale rollout. “Testing a second or third tier market gives you a chance to work out the kinks.

Take the drive-through experience for example. It’s actually a very challenging interface to switch to a mobile device.”

Karen Cox, vice president of product and payment solutions for Moneris Solutions in Toronto, says a key contributor to technology advancement in all foodservice sectors has been the pervasive adoption of tablets. “There’s an app for everything now. Restaurant owners can manage their entire operations on tablet-based apps and in a much more sophisticated way than a POS system at a much lower cost. You can even use tablets to process a secure payment with peripherals and a mobile pinpad. With a tablet, even if your central management system is down, you can still work offline and run your restaurant.”

For anyone with an IP drop, it’s easy to connect all sorts of devices, she adds. “You’ll probably find Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and cellular connectivity in any restaurant today.”

For Primucci the business case is a simple one. “This is the way the world is going. We have to be present at every customer interaction point. IT is our investment into our future, because that’s the way the next generation of customers will be doing their business; whether it’s buying a pizza or a pair of shoes.”

C+ Denise Deveau is a Toronto-based freelance writer.

She can be reached at denisedeveau@bell.net. www.connectionsplus.ca

EVE

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FE ATU R E

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Where The Fan Is Now

King

Photo courtesy of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment.

MLSE is investing heavily in a wireless infrastructure, largely due to the expectations of the paying public.

By Dave Webb

n July, Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment (MLSE) – parent company of the National Hockey League’s Toronto Maple Leafs, the National Basketball Association’s Toronto Raptors, Toronto FC and the Toronto Argonauts – announced plans for a new scoreboard for its flagship Air Canada Centre.

Set to be unveiled this fall, it will feature a 23-foot aluminum maple leaf surrounded by four 32-by-18-foot screens, and will weigh in at about 80,000 pounds and cost $10 million. It’s comparatively smaller predecessor will be shipped up the street to the Ricoh Coliseum, the home of MLSE’s second-tier pro hockey franchise, the American Hockey League’s Toronto Marlies.

It is a trend in sports venues across North America – in fact, across the world – to provide a more immersive spectator experience.

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Concordia University’s Anouk Belanger analyzed the role of sports venues as an inter-urban competitive phenomenon in a paper called Sports Venues and the Spectacularization of Urban Spaces in North America, but many venue operators will tell you the biggest competition doesn’t come from other cities or even other venues.

It comes from the couch and the 60-inch flatscreen. When you can sit at home for free, with perfect sight lines, and drink moderately-priced beer while you’re watching the game, what’s the incentive to spend a small fortune on tickets and $12 hot dogs at a live venue? That demands a more immersive experience. Sometimes it involves an 80,000-pound scoreboard. But more and more venues are also looking to wireless technology to attract and absorb spectators. That is certainly Continued on page 24.

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Photos courtesy of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment.

MLSE examined its portfolio of services and venues. “(We realized) we had one shot at doing it right,” he says. There were a number of stakeholders to be satisfied: internal staff that had operational considerations; partners like the media with their own service agenda; and, the biggest stakeholder of all, the one that pays for the venue, the fans.

“But then, something else happened as well,” he says. Team management began to assert itself. “The team that used to be about the gut feel and the heart started to turn into a game of analytics, calculation, data collection, and we were slaughtered with the volume of requests and requirements to facilitate that data collection, that next generation of sports management.”

It’s more than about the ticket-holder being able to access minute-by-minute replay content. Barclays MLSE is in the process of completing a massive Center in Brooklyn, N.Y., is one of the first sports veninfrastructure upgrade at BMO Field. ues built from the ground up in the wireless age. Technicians checked the wireless reception in every one of the almost 15,000 seats in the arena. The fan experience is important, but it’s not the only thing going on.

About two years ago, MLSE began to partner with networking giant Cisco Systems Inc. to look at how to enable these services across all of MLSE’s facilities.

“We’re just in the process of doing the completion of a massive infrastructure project,” Puric says. “Today, we are catering to 22,000 people at BMO Field who are expecting nothing less than a firstclass wireless experience, which, quite honestly, five or 10 years ago, was impossible.” The first arenas and stadiums with wireless access emerged about a decade ago, Puric points out that the exthe case at the recently revamped BMO Field, home to the Toronto perience was “miserable.”

FC and next year also the Argonauts. MLSE is among the venue “The technology just wasn’t there, and the expectations of the owners that have invested in wireless infrastructure to compete with fans to be able to log in and check their e-mail wasn’t that important. the flatscreen experience.

Today, though, fans are expecting to be catered to: Not just being “We used technology. We had switches, we had wireless, we able to access Twitter and Facebook, but they’re actually expecting provided a service, and everybody was happy. Then something you to know who they are when they come in, they expect you to changed,” says Sasha Puric, vice president of technology for MLSE know where the crowds in the washrooms are.”

“The business transformed a few years ago. The expectations of Beyond game information, internal communications, team telemfans, the expectations of communities, to have a much more en- etry demands, the venue’s wireless infrastructure has to deal with gaging experience, in stadiums and arenas, has pushed us to think visitors’ physical security. about where we are going to take this, where we’re going to take the There’s a lot on that wireless plate. “Everything we started to do next generation of fan experience, where we are going to take the with Cisco was about creating the platform, the infrastructure, that we can layer the fan experience (on),” Puric says. “There’s digital next generation of arena experience.”

MLSE’s first question: Is it enough to just offer wireless connectiv- signage to be rolled out. There are patterns of behavior to be underity on its properties? Apparently not. “Media is one of our biggest stood. And there’s the ultimate mystery to be unraveled: Who is this clients in the Air Canada Centre,” Puric says. Through its 20-year person visiting my venue? The average visitor comes to the venue history, media outlets have had demands to be able to deliver con- five or six times a year. How do you connect with the anonymous tent to consumers. While MLSE was meeting that expectation, the visitor? One of the greatest mysteries is for us to start to unlock is the identity of the people in the building. Then we can cater to them company started looking deeper into what it was providing.

“We’d been catering to the media so they could file their scores better than we do today.”

C+ for the last 20 years,” adds Puric. But MLSE began to think about how deep it could go into providing services. “Is the product enough? No. Dave Webb is a Toronto-based freelance writer.

It comes down to services.”

He can be reached at dave@dweebmedia.ca 24

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䐀䤀匀䌀伀嘀䔀刀 䠀伀圀 䔀嘀䔀刀夀吀䠀䤀一䜀 䌀伀一一䔀䌀吀匀 伀䌀吀伀䈀䔀刀 ㈀㠀 ☀ ㈀㤀Ⰰ ㈀ ㄀㔀 吀伀刀伀一吀伀 䌀伀一䜀刀䔀匀匀 䌀䔀一吀刀䔀 䘀䔀䄀吀唀刀䔀䐀 䔀堀䠀䤀䈀䤀吀伀刀 倀䄀嘀䤀䰀䤀伀一匀㨀

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䘀刀䔀䔀 刀䔀䜀䤀匀吀刀䄀吀䤀伀一 唀一吀䤀䰀 匀䔀倀吀䔀䴀䈀䔀刀 ㌀ Ⰰ ㈀ ㄀㔀 圀圀圀⸀ 䌀 䄀一䄀䐀䤀䄀一 圀 䤀刀䔀䰀䔀匀匀 吀 刀䄀䐀䔀 匀 䠀伀圀 ⸀䌀伀䴀 ㈀ ㄀㔀 匀倀伀一匀伀刀匀 ☀ 䴀䔀䐀䤀䄀 倀䄀刀吀一䔀刀匀

FE ATU R E

Wearable focus shifts to the enterprise The future is vertical as consumer interest fails to ignite

By Carmi Levy

o one ever said that every technology industry prediction was supposed to come true as originally promised.

If that were the case, by now we’d all be wearing smart glasses and barking voice commands at the miniaturized electronics perched at the tips of our noses, hanging off our ears or sewn into the collars of our coats.

Instead of thumb-typing into smartphones, we’d be wearing smart t-shirts, our shoes would count our steps, our watches would check our bags in at the airport and our business casual khaki pants would adjust for our ever-changing waist size.

While most of these technologies now exist in some form, consumer demand for them remains soft. Exhibit A: Google Glass,

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which was once heralded as the first commercially viable smartglass solution. Despite tight controls over who could buy the hightech frames and what was expected of them once they brought them home, the initial iteration failed to spark much interest beyond the early adopters who evangelized them.

The reasons Google Glass failed to capture consumer interest are easy to understand. Like any first-generation technology, they were expensive, with a clunky, radically different interface, a battery that barely lasted until lunch, almost-invisible developer support, and a similar lack of a killer app that might convince consumers to abandon the comfort of their smartphones. Google eventually – and quietly – shelved its ambitious plans to get consumers on board. www.connectionsplus.ca

FEATURE

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If wearables are going to reshape how we live, then it will be the Too much choice, too early

the U.S. enterprise wearables market will reach US$8.5 billion by 2020. While the consumer wearables market is tracking at a compound annual rate of 38%, the company projects an enterprise wearable CAGR of 139% between 2015 and 2019, with strong demand in healthcare, energy, industry, field service, government and the military.

Google’s recent relaunch of its smart glasses project – now called Google Glass Enterprise Edition – serves as a template for the enterprise-led wearable revolution. Updated hardware, combined with direct partnerships in specific industry verticals like manufacturing, engineering, healthcare, government and military, will help shape the ecosystem for wearables more effectively than a less focused consumer push ever could.

Stewart sees wearables like these as gamechangers in a wide range of enterprise scenarios.

“I actually think that probably the single biggest market will not be for people who already know how to fix something, but for people who are in the process of training, learning or apprenticing,” he says. “Content will be a significant barrier – it’s a chicken-and-egg situation, where when you buy the devices there’s no content. But we’ll get over that limitation eventually, too.”

enterprise that

Duncan Stewart, director of research for technology, media and telecommunications at Deloitte Canada says most technologies fail to be adopted for a number of reasons rather than one single make-orbreak item. The currently fragmented ecosystem for wrist-mounted devices gives IT departments so much choice – and a fear of picking the losing one – that they simply wait on the sidelines until the market matures. The failure in the consumer space could be slowing things down on the enterprise side, as well.

“If people use wearables for gaming at home, while they’re driving or in other parts of their personal life, then adding them to their work life wouldn’t seem like a particularly disruptive or invasive change,” Stewart said. “But since that consumer market has failed to happen, that may have slowed the enterprise market as well.”

The tendency for initial-generation enterprise wearables – notably wristbands – to be single-function devices isn’t helping advance the enterprise agenda, either.

“The problem with most wearables is they only do one thing at a time, like presence or allow building or system access,” says Stewart. “It’s simple and it’s cheap, but on the other hand it solves so few problems that can’t be solved by having people use a regular NFCchipped card on a lanyard, which is what everybody does anyway.

So is putting it on your wrist better? Sure. But is it enough better to make you want to change your entire system, buy a whole bunch of devices and learn how to use it? Maybe not. The limited functionality of a wrist-mounted wearable is so limited that the market may be too small for now.”

While multifunction hardware will eventually begin to loosen demand for truly value-added solutions relative to what’s already out there, Stewart says the market isn’t there yet.

gets the party

Glasses follow watches Despite the relative success of the Apple Watch, which now sells more than all other smartwatches combined, the consumer market for wearables is still far from its tipping point. But it isn’t consumers who will drive this market, anyway. Because if wearables are going to reshape how we live, then it will be the enterprise that gets the party started.

Data from Compass Intelligence bears that out. It estimates www.connectionsplus.ca

started.

”

Understanding the need But before content can be built, the use cases need to be understood by corporate decision-makers.

“There is still a very big gap between the interest in these types of devices and the actual appetite, uptake and use,” says Dr. Michael Bjorn, head of research for Ericsson ConsumerLab. “Is that gap closing? In the two years we’ve been studying it, we haven’t seen much movement, but it’s still too short a time period to really tell which way it will go.”

Bjorn says the limited inroads of wearables to-date could be due to a number of factors.

“Maybe the products are not mature yet, and maybe the technology isn’t really there yet,” he says. “The companies addressing the space haven’t gone all the way in terms of understanding what the real requirements are. Maybe we need to also see the industry mature a little more to see what those requirements really are.

There’s a potentially big ecosystem that needs to form, and that ecosystem isn’t really there yet.”

September/October 2015

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27

AD_LCBP_C

FE ATU R E

”

For all the One such killer app could be security.

Traditional approaches to authentication, for example, often force compromises between security and convenience.

“Right now, if you speak to employees in almost any company, you’ll hear stories about how frustrated they are by all the different modes of access to the systems that are required to make the company run,” says Shawn Chance, vice president of marketing and business development at Toronto-based wearable vendor Nymi. “It quickly becomes painful for them – imagine giving a presentation to a client and your laptop keeps locking up at preset intervals – but it also has a cost for the company because of all the time spent resetting passwords and replacing lost fobs.”

Chance says wearables can play a crucial role in establishing a sense of balance between security and convenience.

“Making some of that friction go away for the users and increasing their productivity while maintaining the level of security that the company mandates and requires is fundamental,” he adds. “We actually think you can have both, that you can have convenience and security together.”

promise that

wearables hold

for the enterprise,

unseen in a lot of cases – you’ll be able to quickly take pictures or capture video or audio without anybody noticing. Wearable form factors make it much easier to be under the radar.”

The risks of bring-your-own

Rau says the continued blurring of lines between personal and professional use of all connected devices has significant implications for enterprise adopters.

“Companies have to consider how they’ll deal with this onslaught of new devices that are coming into their environment,” he says. “What additional steps do they have to take to allow on the one hand the end user to have the flexibility to use technology for both professional and personal use, but on the other hand to protect the company assets from being exposed?”

Rau says wearables will change the nature of how we interact with our devices – and that will keep security pros busy.

“We’re moving away from clicking buttons on a screen toward gestures, voice commands and other new types of interactions,” he says, which gives hackers more opportunities to trick end users into doing things they shouldn’t be doing. “Attackers are always trying to change and adapt to new entry methods, and security strategies have to keep up.”

Meanwhile, Miessler says the bring-your-own-device speed bumps that vexed most organizations over the last decade or so will come back to haunt them as wearable momentum builds in the enterprise.

“Companies need to be security-first, but instead of IT putting a new solution through a proper evaluation and rollout, someone might walk in and ask to make it work. As before, the tail will be wagging the dog,” says Miessler.

“It could simply be that employees genuinely want to bring their wearables into the office, and they’re simply trying to retain them.

Just like they did with smartphones and tablets, new grads will want to have their wearable gadgets at work, and for an organization to tell them they can’t have them will probably be a significant detractor for wanting to work there.”

Despite the relatively slow uptake of wearables in the enterprise, Deloitte’s Stewart says it’s only a temporary state of affairs.

“Virtually nobody is saying we have abandoned our wearables project and we never expect this to happen,” he says. “Instead, they’re saying we started playing around with it two years ago, we continue to play around with it, we’ll play around with it this year and maybe next, but we are not rolling it out in the near term. We’ll get there, just not now. Everybody’s talking. Everybody’s excited. It’s always a question of when not if.”

C+

security concerns could prove

challenging unless companies plan accordingly.

Not without its challenges For all the promise that wearables hold for the enterprise, security concerns could prove challenging unless companies plan accordingly.

“The more Internet connected devices you have, the higher the risk,” says Alexander Rau, national information security strategist with Symantec Canada. “On the one hand, companies want to make money, attract more customers, and grow the business. They want to jump on the wearable and Internet of Things bandwagon as quickly as they can so they are one step ahead of the competition when offering new products and services.”

But Rau says in the rush to remain competitive, security is often overlooked.

“Companies need to really balance the need for competitiveness with their own security requirements,” he adds. “They really need to bring their security department into the conversation so as to not to forge ahead with a solution that truly would represent a risk to the consumer and the organization.”

It might sound familiar to anyone who’s spent any time in IT over the past decade.

“We’re seeing the same mistakes being made that were made in lots of different spaces, including network security, mobile security, and Web application security,” says Daniel Miessler, principal security architect with security software suite vendor HP Fortify. “The problem with wearables for enterprises is that they’re pretty much 28

Connections+

September/October 2015

”

Carmi Levy (@carmilevy) is a London, Ont.-based independent technology analyst and journalist. www.connectionsplus.ca

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2

1

4

3 1.Elma Electronic

2. HEWLETT PACKARD

3. EARTHCAM

4. MICROSOFT

Elma Electronic Inc. has released the StorSys-3000, a high-capacity Network Attached Storage (NAS) mission system that withstands harsh, rugged environments for use in IP-based military and defense applications. The 3U VPX computer includes dual 10 GbE ports that feature integrated TCP/ IP offload engines. This frees up the Core i7 processor enabling critical resources to be directed to mission compute tasks, while obtaining optimal link speeds on each input port. These ports, as well as additional I/O such as a VGA, two USB 2.0, three GPIO and an additional two GbE ports, are utilized via MIL-C-38999 connectors on the front end. A four slot storage array supports over 8 TB of solid state MLC storage with RAID protection. www.elma.com.

HP recently launched the lightweight HP mt42 quad-core mobile thin client, which contains 10% higher clock speed and an additional two cores of processing power than the previous generation. The HP mt42 is designed for business customers in the financial, healthcare, training, services and government sectors. End-users and admins alike can now access the cloud and their virtual desktops on the move with the latest Windows 10 IoT Enterprise for Thin Clients. It also features a 14-inch diagonal full HD5 display; the highest HP Mobile Thin Client display resolution of 1920 x 1080, plus a USB-C(tm) port and 150 degree extra-wide hinge range for extensive viewing options. Other features include the new 2015 HP-advanced spillresistant keyboard and touchpad with four external click-buttons. www.hp.com.

The Site Map Cam from EarthCam is a free app that helps users document conditions and track progress from the palm of their hand. Site Map Cam delivers professional results quickly, thanks to the iPhone’s GPS technology and HD camera, the company says.

Simply upload a site plan, align to the app’s integrated map and start taking pictures - it’s as easy to use as Instagram, the company adds.

Whether you are breaking ground on a construction project or traveling to the zoo, all details can be tracked.

An Android version will be coming to Google Play in October. EarthCam provides live streaming video, time-lapse construction cameras and photography documentation for corporate and government clients in major cities around the world. www.sitemapcam.com.

Microsoft recently launched two new Windows Phones in Canada, the new Lumia 535 (pictured) and the Lumia 640 XL. Both phones are available now, exclusively at the Microsoft store. Each offers the latest Windows Phone experience and are supported with regular over-the-air updates for the newest software. The Lumia 535 is priced at $179 and features a 5” display with an assortment of colour options including bright blue, green and orange alongside matte grey, black and white. It comes with 8GB of memory and is expandable up to 128GB with a microSD card. Priced at $339, the Lumia 640 XL comes preinstalled with the Office suite.

The phone also carries a 13MP ZEISS optics camera. www.microsoft.ca.

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September/October 2015

www.connectionsplus.ca

wo new he new Lumia able oft indows pported tes for ia 535 a 5” colour green rey, h 8GB up to riced es ite.

P ZEISS

New & Noteworthy

cancer

6

changes

5

everything

7 unless

we

8 change

cancer

5. anritsu

6. Berk-Tek Leviton

7. HP

8. legrand

Anritsu Company has expanded the testing capability of its portable MT1000A Network Master Pro and MT1100A Network Master Flex all-in-one transport network testers. The enhancements include support of CPRI/OBSAI and RFC 6349 TCP throughput testing, OTN multi-stage mapping for OTU3/4, a remote operation tool, MDIO analysis, an event logging feature with filtering and support of a Video Inspection Probe (VIP). With the enhancements, network managers and field technicians have a singleinstrument handheld solution to test new technologies designed into mobile fronthaul networks, as well as OTN, Ethernet, Fiber Channel and SDH/SONET and other technologies in transport network technologies, the company said. www.anritsu.com.

Berk-Tek Leviton Technologies has announced that its CX6850 Cat 6A Premium+ UTP system was successfully tested to deliver 100-watt Power over Ethernet (PoE), enabling the transmission of power and data to a wider range of remote devices. The ability to deliver 100 watts supports emerging PoE standards, such as the draft IEEE 802.3bt (type 4) PoE standard, which is scheduled for ratification in 2017. The CX6850 system includes Berk-Tek LANmarkTM-XTP cable, Leviton Atlas-X1TM componentrated connectors and patch cords and Leviton component-rated 110-style patch panels. According to the company, next-generation powered devices will require greater bandwidth than Gigabit Ethernet and more delivered power. www.berkteklevitontechnologies. com.

HP has announced the HP t420, a cloud-ready thin client for task workers in call centre, desktopas-a-service, and remote kiosk environments. It offers a choice of essential operating systems including Linux-based HP Smart Zero Core and HP ThinPro, and Windows Embedded 7. HP also announced the new HP mt245 Mobile Thin Client, which is designed for flexible cloud computing on-the-go. The thin client delivers pro-class user features and critical management software at an affordable price, the company said.

The Windows Embedded Standard 7E tools, the programs, and the resources are all integrated into the lightweight design with a 14-inch diagonal HD screen. www.hp.com.

The Q-Series Cabinet from Legrand is a UL 2416 listed, 19” EIA offering for a range of applications, from single racks to small computer rooms and data centres of all sizes. The new cabinet complements the Q-Series family, broadening the offering of physical infrastructure products, the company says. The Q-Series product line-up was first introduced by Legrand last year after its acquisition of Quiktron. The line-up now includes standard EIA racks and cabinets, in addition to existing cable assemblies and connectivity products from Quiktron. For high performance applications, Legrand also offers LX cabinets, Mighty Mo racks, Infinium fiber and Clarity copper. www.legrand.com.

Change depends on you. To donate or volunteer, visit cancer.ca

www.connectionsplus.ca

September/October 2015

Connections+

35

L it e rat u re R eviews

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The magazine for ICT professionals, Connections+ readership targets individuals who purchase, design, specify, install, maintain and test structured cabling, networking and telecom products as well as facilities management specialists and senior IT executives who are responsible for overseeing the implementation and installation of these initiatives.

For more information contact Maureen Levy – 416-510-5111 or mlevy@connectionsplus.ca

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TH E B ACK PAG E

The WiFi and LTE battle ground at enterprise DefiningWE’RE the true mobile PROUD TO BE premises ONEis OF CANADA’S just about to start

FOREMOST DISTRIBUTORS OFphone MOBILE INFRASTRUC TURE is LTE-enabled and your office is WiFi-equipped.

I would argue it is about to start. With the move of applications from local premises to the cloud, a lot of what we AND TEST & MEASUREMENT EQUIPMENT

By Peter Linder

Business

obile offices and enterprises have been a vision since early this millennium, but still have a bit to go. This article is about how mobile businesses can be a broader and faster developing market.

The role of the mobile business landscape has evolved in a couple of distinct phases. The introduction of smartphones gave birth to the second screen phenomena. A smartphone moved into every pocket as no business could thrive with PCs alone. Professionals were quick in embracing the smartphone and its status grew.

The mobile-first paradigm affected anyone developing applications targeting both devices. Smartphones and tablets become the tool supporting us in waking up and going to sleep with work if we wanted too. Growing screens and better applications are now taking us into the mobile only world.

The use of devices connected via wires is winding down. Remote working has developed far beyond home working. Your printer and visual communication system might still need a wire.

But expect the rest of the professional world to be mobile going forward.

M

Mobile Cloud break down business silos with new forms of collaborations It is not only the device that is changing. It is the way we create results and deliver. E-mail used to be a productivity enabler; today it slows down most organizations.

The rapid growth of e-mail marketing is making it harder and harder for the valuable mails to get focus.

We are more and more dependent on inter- and intracompany collaboration to achieve our results. Collaboration applications are focusing on tying together specialized groups of people. We do our work in shorter and shorter stints.

Collaboration applications are enabling this development. Collaborations where users can contribute and access existing deliverables via a mobile device. We conduct more and more of the work away from a desk.

The time available until all team members expect to have access to the outcome from most recent workshop is short. Follow up on short actions from meetings can be done on your down time rather than requiring a larger uninterrupted time slot.

34

Connections+

September/October 2015

You might argue this has already happened. Your smart-

today consider LAN traffic will move too.

LTE coverage is insufficient in many indoor locations where we work. WiFi is in most buildings, but as a complement to fixed, not designed as the primary or only access method. We can expect a dynamic market the next few years where mobile businesses connect via a hybrid involving both LTE and WiFi. An important aspect of the evolution is seamless access hand-over between two technologies. We will see new business models evolving the byte centric all-for free and bytes-for-bucks. There are new values to exploit in bundles together with the raw connectivity.

The role of 5G and Cloud in unlocking new industry verticals Overlay networks and new terminals have been the way to introduce new mobile network generations. 2G, 3G and 4G were all introduced in that way. Adjacent industries adopted these technologies at a later stage of the maturity cycle.

The introduction of 5G will be different. The 5G radio will be more of an evolution from existing mobile and wireless technologies. Delivering value to mobile businesses will be key from day one. Businesses needing more bandwidth, lower power utilization or lower cost than what we have today. 5G is not only about the radio interface. Many new verticals require a slice of the network dedicated to their specific needs. We can expect a lot of the ecosystem development in this direction to take place using the existing technology base.

The introduction of 5G can then provide value in accelerating the pace of deployment. As well as increasing the breath of applications we can support.

Role of enterprise and office decline over time With increasing cross company collaborations and rapid growth of work away from a desk it is time to rethink. A future of mobile-enabled businesses is likely. One where you and I and our mobile-only work environment is a vital enabler for raising our productivity. Contact me if you think e-mail will survive this transformation.

C+ Peter Linder is Head of Cloud and IP sales in North America and a Networked Society evangelist for Ericsson. He can be reached at peter.linder@ ericsson.com or via Twitter: @OneLinders. www.connectionsplus.ca

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