Mobile Device Management (MDM)

When asked about the future of the overall smartphone market, Lazaridis's answer is quite simple:

"It will grow rapidly." he says, laughing. "Very rapidly."

That much is certain. In fact, recent research from In-Stat suggests that the global smartphone market will grow by more than 30 percent each year through 2012.

And that's good news, of course, for companies like RIM, Nokia, Apple and Motorola, the leading worldwide smartphone manufacturers (by sales, according to Canalys), but it also presents a serious challenge for CIOs and IT departments looking to keep track of and maintain their users' mobile devices.

Lazaridis identifies mobile device management (MDM) and monitoring as the biggest challenges that IT departments will face in the coming years as a result of the expected explosion of smartphones in and outside of the enterprise.

As companies realize the true potential of deploying devices like BlackBerrys and Windows Mobile handsets to different sets of staffers who require various permissions and IT policies, the challenge of managing these diverse deployments will only intensify, Lazaridis says.

That's why RIM spends so much time and effort building new and intricate functionality into its BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES), according to Lazaridis. For instance, BES 4.1 SP5 recently hit the Web with a new feature set meant specifically to ease IT headaches associated with BlackBerry management and upkeep. For example, the new BlackBerry Monitoring Service aims to help organizations reduce BlackBerry downtime and improve the overall performance of their BES infrastructure. The service includes monitoring, alerting, troubleshooting and reporting capabilities to help proactively identify and resolve issues before users even have time to report them.

The next iteration of the BES software, version 5.0, which is expected by year end, will include many more such features, Lazaridis says. But he's quick to note that the company is not trying to outdo or even compete with third-party vendors who offer MDM products and services, like Zenprise or Visage Mobile--both of which were WES exhibitors. Instead, RIM's trying to compliment partners' product with its own.

'"Our goal is to create a full, rich, environment," he says.