Todays fragmented mobile landscape is directly affecting many organisations mobile plans, with 40 per cent of Fortune 500 companies stating that developing mobile apps across multiple operating systems and devices is the biggest challenge to their mobile strategy. Other top challenges ranked by corporations include keeping up with changes in the mobile market (27 per cent); and supporting connectivity and technology challenges/updates (20 per cent).
The findings come from the second annual Mobile Marketing and Commerce Study, commissioned by Kony, the mobile platform provider. The study surveyed over 100 Fortune 500 corporations to uncover insights relating to their mobile computing challenges and strategic initiatives.
The iPhone retained its position as the highest-prioritised operating system for companies to support for the second year in a row. This despite Nielsens recent report stating that Android holds the largest market share among mobile operating systems. Android comes in as the second-highest priority for the second year in a row, with BlackBerry falling to third place on the list. It had previously tied with Android in Konys 2010 survey.
“As companies increasingly look to mobile to help them achieve strategic business goals, they are faced with very real challenges due to the fragmentation of the mobile industry,” says Kony founder and CEO, Raj Koneru. “With the rate at which the mobile landscape is evolving, its vital for these companies to choose a partner with capabilities across a multitude of devices and channels, including tablets, to ensure their offering reaches their full customer base.”
In a report from March 2011, Gartner predicted that nearly 70m tablets would be sold worldwide in 2011. When considering how rapidly the tablet market is growing, along with the vast potential that the iPad and other tablets offer businesses, its perhaps surprising that, according to the survey, only 25 per cent of respondents have plans to deploy a tablet offering in the near future. On top of that, only 2 per cent of respondents believe that developing an offering for the iPad is a priority. 
The lack of urgency these companies are taking toward developing tablet offerings is not due to lack of resources. In fact, the survey reveals that many companies are now finding it easier to procure the necessary funding to develop and deploy their mobile offerings. 89 per cent of respondents said that they can obtain funding with reasonable or little effort; up from 73 per cent in Konys 2010 survey. Along with this, only 11 per cent of companies says they find it difficult to fund their mobile initiatives, a figure that is down from 27 per cent a year ago.
“The internal debate at many organisations is no longer about whether or not they need a mobile offering, but about the most effective way to develop and deploy one across all devices and operating systems,” concludes Koneru. “We address this problem head on, having built our platform from the ground up to develop, deploy and maintain offerings across numerous devices, operating systems and channels.”
You can download the full report for free here.
