Android’s growing popularity amongst consumers and its massive enterprise adoption is a proven fact around the world. Today, global organizations are giving added importance to securing and managing their enterprise endpoints running on Android, more than ever before. In fact, Android Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) is being widely chosen by more and more companies across the world for offering substantially improved productivity and enhanced user experience.
Let’s dig into the topic to understand Android Enterprise better, the advantages of Android Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM), and its expanding impact on businesses across the globe.
What is Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM)?
EMM can be defined as a framework of sophisticated and evolved features that are collectively used to manage a fleet of corporate-owned and employee-owned endpoints (like smartphones, POS devices, digital signages, tablets, laptops, desktops, etc.) along with corporate content, data, and apps. The core features that are incorporated in an EMM solution are Mobile Device Management (MDM), Mobile Content Management (MCM), Mobile Application Management (MAM), Remote monitoring and management, App Wrapping, Containerization, Identity, and Access Management. In simple words, an EMM solution is used by companies to ensure that the mobile devices and apps used by the employees are adequately managed, monitored, and secured to drive improved employee productivity, corporate data protection, cost efficiency, and overall organizational operations.
Read More: Understand the difference between EMM, MDM, and UEM
Benefits of Android Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM)
Android as a platform has evolved through the years to better serve and support the enterprise space and organizations are heavily dependent on multiple Android-based endpoints to drive productivity, operational efficiency, and data security at multiple levels.
Let’s look at the core enterprise benefits that accompany Android Enterprise Mobility Management.
Android Enterprise Recommended
The Google validated program named Android Enterprise Recommended helps organizations to select the right Android devices to meet their business purposes. It does so by maintaining and providing a list of approved devices that meet the set of elevated enterprise-level requirements. Businesses leverage AER to successfully and assuredly select, manage and deploy a fleet of Android devices that come loaded with the right and standard set of enterprise features and always stay updated with the latest Android security patches.
Read More: The Fundamentals of Android Enterprise Recommended
Comprehensive Device Management Options
The wide range of management APIs provided by Android allows companies to enjoy flexibility from a device management point of view. It also allows the IT managers to enforce security policies, network configurations, and corporate compliances to prevent data leakage and control user activities. Android Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) allows IT to use containerization for creating an OS-level separation between the company and personal data. Whether a company needs to manage corporate-owned single-purpose endpoints, kiosk machines, corporate-owned personally-enabled or employee-owned devices, Android EMM has an option for multiple deployment and device-ownership cases.
Enterprise Security Features
Enterprise Mobility Management in Android-based devices allows the company IT admin to use a wide range of security features and functionalities. IT admin can apply or enforce a number of security policies regarding the usages of devices, apps, networks, and content. They can perform whitelisting of apps and websites and can facilitate remote wipe of data and remote lock of devices. Alongside, they can enforce passcode protection policies. On top of that, Google Play Protect is Android’s very own mobile threat detection service powered by machine learning, which stops malicious apps from entering the device. It scans every app on a daily basis and also points out the vulnerabilities of in-built private apps.
Read More: The evolution of Android over the years
Wide range of devices, multiple use cases
Android has a device for every organizational requirement and every user profile. Starting from affordable handheld devices that are fully managed with work-profile, to corporate-owned single-purpose devices like TV Sticks, POS devices, RFID readers, etc., to rugged handheld devices and tablets used in rough terrains, Android has covered every enterprise use-case. The platform has indeed proliferated deep into the global markets with a long list of innovative devices to choose from.
Option to leverage kiosk mode
With the help of an EMM solution, Android devices can be easily locked down in kiosk mode running a single app or multiple apps or even a browser (pre-selected and installed by the IT admin). Android-based kiosk devices (whether standalone or handheld) are used for business-specific and single-purpose requirements and scenarios. Business IT admin can remotely set a kiosk mode on Android devices using an EMM console and can take total control over the corporate-owned devices after configuring the right set of usage and security policies on them to meet specific business needs.
Read More: Understanding Android Management Software
So, Android Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) includes the following functionalities for device management.
- Containerization to separate/isolate work-profile (work-related apps, files, and content) from personal profile (individual apps, content, and docs) in BYO devices.
- Fully-managed and corporate-owned devices that are exclusively used for work purposes and allow only corporate apps and content.
- Fully-managed and corporate-owned devices with a work profile that are allowed to be used for work as well as personal purposes by employees (Android 8.0+)
- Dedicated, single-use, and corporate-owned devices used for specific or limited use cases such as kiosks, digital signage, and POS machines.
- Automatic and compulsory device-level encryption
- Zero-Touch enrollment (out-of-the-box) for Android-based devices (8.0 and above).
- Managed Google Play allows the IT admin to use a secure mechanism for app approval, app discovery, private app publishing, web app publishing in managed Android devices using an EMM console.
Also Read: Know all about Google Zero-Touch enrollment
Android EMM also allows the IT admin to silently install/uninstall apps with the help of remote configuration of app settings that are pushed on the managed devices. IT admin can also gain control over Google Chrome to define and drive a secure and work-focused browsing experience. IT can also enforce data usage policies like whitelisting apps and websites, setting kiosk modes, disabling data roaming, etc. to control costs due to data overages.
In simple words, Android Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) is empowering organizations to have granular control over all the managed enterprise endpoints to enhance employee productivity, corporate data security while streamlining device, app, and content management at large.
