LogMeIn has released a version of its remote support product, LogMeIn Rescue, for the iPad. The new release gives IT helpdesks and service providers the ability to remotely support iPads entering the workplace. Initial features include the ability to remotely support iPad users using chat, as well as capabilities designed to ease common issues with email and calendar configuration.

The iPad support features are immediately available to new and existing customers as part of LogMeIn Rescue’s mobile add-on, which also includes support for iPhone, BlackBerry, Symbian and Windows Mobile devices. 

LogMeIn notes that with 3m iPads sold in the first 80 days, the device, together with other tablet computers, represents a new wave of consumer-bought mobile devices with potential work impact. They also represent new implications for IT support of personally-owned devices within the workplace, which, to date, has primarily centred around consumer-bought smartphones. According to a recent survey from Forrester Research, more than half of all firms already support personally-owned smartphones to a certain extent.

“From a business perspective, the iPad introduces an invaluable new tool for the mobile professional, but it also introduces support challenges that have become all too familiar to today’s IT helpdesk,” says Lee Jacobs, president and CEO of Manage IT Networks, a LogMeIn Rescue customer and an early example of businesses adopting the iPad for its own mobile workers. The outsourced IT company, with clients in states throughout the American southwest, has armed its technicians with iPads to improve its support to clients while on the go. The company is now looking at ways to help other businesses support the arrival of tablets into their IT environment.    

“As with the iPhone before it, the iPad will enter the business whether procured by IT, or, in many cases, simply brought into the work environment by employees who personally purchased the device,” adds Jacobs. “Whatever your mobile policy, having the tools to support the iPad and consumer purchased mobile devices is rapidly becoming a must have for both internal and external IT organizations.”

There’s a video of the new iPad support features here.