iOS outshines Android among corporate crowd, says survey
Nine out of 10 people surveyed by Piper Jaffray said they provide iOS devices to their employees.
Apple's iOS is the dominant platform in the corporate world, based on a survey conducted by investment firm Piper Jaffray.
Of the 112 corporate information officers polled by Piper Jaffray, 98 percent said they favor iOS for business operations and 89 percent said they equip staff with iOS devices, according to an investors note released Tuesday by analyst Gene Munster. The survey includes both iPhones and iPads.
In contrast, 79 percent of the CIOs surveyed said they support Android, 58 percent support Windows, and 24 percent support Blackberry. Further, 57 percent said they provide Android devices to their employees, 30 percent supply Windows devices, and 25 percent supply BlackBerry devices.
That's good news for Apple, which aims to reach more business customers. Last July, the iPhone maker forged an alliance with IBM to create apps that combine the consumer-friendly aspects of Apple's iPhone and iPad mobile devices, with IBM's data analytics capabilities. Big Blue would also sell industry-focused iPhones and iPads as a bundle. In December, the two companies unveiled their first apps as part of the new lineup.
The survey suggests the corporate world prefers buying devices from a single source. Running on thousands of smartphones, phablets and tablets, Android leads in market share around the world, according to reports from Strategy Analytics, ComScore and others. Apple is the dominant player in the enterprise market, according to a November report from Good Technology.
Overall, tablet adoption in the business world may slow in 2015. Half of the the organizations surveyed by Piper Jaffray said they expect to deploy tablets to their workers this year, down from 60 percent last year. Even so, Munster said he believes tablets will continue to grow among enterprises, given their current low adoption rate.
"We continue to view it as an opportunity for tablet manufacturers, most significantly Apple, which we believe has the largest share of enterprise tablets," he said. "We note that for Apple, the IBM relationship represents a potential opportunity to accelerate tablet adoption, but it is still too early to tell the impact of the relationship."