Businesses are rethinking the management of endpoint security by unifying the administration and securing of desktops, notebooks, smartphones and tablets with “EMU” solutions.

Gartner has just released its Magic Quadrant highlighting the players in this new market. The chaotic arrival of mobility in companies is not unlike that of microcomputing in the 80s. Uses have prevailed well before IT teams have time to control the ins and outs, mainly in security, the invasion of smartphones, tablets and personal ultrabooks in the walls of the company. Since then, other objects have also infiltrated this landscape, such as smartwatches, sports coaches, IP webcams and other connected objects. Evolution of mobility management To specifically address these mobile devices, the security solution vendors first proposed tools that essentially allow remote control of some of their functionalities (connectivity, deletion, blocking).

The so-called MDM for Mobile Device Management. Then we realized that it was not enough to administer the mobiles, it was also necessary to control the uses, ie the applications. Thus were born EMM (Enterprise Mobility Management) solutions. With the expansion of BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) and the diversity that it induces in terms of operating systems (Windows 10 and its native support MDM, macOS, etc.), the arrival of Chrome OS computers and Windows 10 S designed to be managed as mobile, companies have sought a new approach unifying the administration of all “endpoints” (desktop PCs, mobile PCs, 2 in 1, tablets, smartphones, IoT) giving birth to a new generation of so-called UEM tools for Unified Endpoint Management.

Unified management of diversity According to the latest Gartner study, UEM tools are different from previous approaches by 4 key features: – Of course, the ability to configure, administer and monitor all forms of endpoints on iOS, Android , Windows 10, macOS or Chrome OS, or IoT technologies. – Unify application configurations, profile management, device compliance and data protection. – Provide a unified view of users (and their multiple devices) by improving the efficiency of user support and collecting analytical data on usage and practices. – Serve as a coordination point to orchestrate other endpoint security technologies such as identity management and infrastructure security tools. EMU players In its new quadrant for unified endpoint management tools in 2018, Gartner is highlighting 5 products deemed to be “Leaders”.

If the presence of VMWare (whose Workspace One offer was born from the acquisition of AirWatch), BlackBerry (with its BlackBerry UEM 12, fruit of the multiplatform opening of its ancestral BES and the acquisition of Good Technology in 2015), IBM (whose offer was built on the acquisition of MaaS360) and MobileIron (one of the rare pioneers of MDM / EMM remained independent) is not surprised, some will be surprised to see the Microsoft solution very well positioned. This confirms the publisher’s growing success in mobile security with its Microsoft 365 strategy that includes Windows, Office 365 and especially the “Enterprise Mobility + Security” suite (Microsoft EMS, of which Intune is one of the cornerstones). Many companies adopting the Office 365 cloud do so by taking advantage of the unified security provided by EMS as the package forms a coherent package. Conversely, some will probably be surprised to see Citrix absent from the “Leaders” square and reclassified to the visionaries. The institute seems to blame the publisher to retain with its offer “Citrix Endpoint Management” an approach far too EMM (the solution is essentially a renaming of the former suite Citrix XenMobile) as to better encourage its customers to adopt an approach “All Citrix” with the Citrix Workspace solution (though ultimately close enough in the spirit of VMware Workspace One).