While Microsoft Corp claims a similar offering for mobile Microsoft-based devices, iAnywhere is the first to have a platform for various types, brands and versions of mobile devices, said iAnywhere VP of marketing Brian Vink. That includes all flavors of smartphones, cell phones, notebooks and PDAs.
Microsoft only supports their devices, we support all, he said.
The platform enables custom and standard enterprise applications to be ported to mobile devices, as well as email servers. Other features include remote device repair, control and patch management.
iAnywhere has developed an architecture, which it calls Always Available, that enables access to email, application and enterprise systems with or without a live connection to the corporate network.
This infrastructure is a relay server architecture, which basically means an architecture that has a server in an enterprise’s DMZ, or demilitarized zone, the subnetwork that sits between a corporate firewall and an external network.
While other device architecture also operates in the DMZ, Vink said iAnywhere’s is the only platform in which email, security, device management and applications share a common infrastructure. That makes it more compact and means fewer resources are needed from the communications network, he said.
In other words, enterprises can do away with having various vendors administer various types of devices and applications.
While iAnywhere hopes to sell its platform with all four components – email, security device management and applications – each software components will also be sold separately, Vink said.
We do see that people in the near term are buying very point solutions or project-based solutions, he said.
The platform architecture will be released in the third quarter, but the four separate components based on the architecture will be launched during the next couple of months.
Pricing per device will start at $100, depending on the combination of components being deployed. The more components an enterprise chooses, the more expensive the platform.
iAnywhere, which is owned by Dublin, California-based Sybase Inc, is calling its new platform the Sybase Information Anywhere Suite.
