Vodafone launches security solution for corporate clients

Vodafone India on Wednesday launched a solution, Secure Device Manager, for its corporate clients which will allow enterprises secure company data on mobile handsets and tablet PCs of their employees.

Vodafone India is the first Indian telecom operator to launch such a service. Its UK parent offers the solution in the UK and Germany and has 18,000 active users.

"With the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) concept picking up pace, increasing number of people prefer smartphones and tablets to access the company's data. Securing these devices, and the data has now become critical," Vodafone India Director (Business Services) Naveen Chopra told reporters on a video conference.

BYOD is a policy now being followed globally by corporates, where employees are allowed to bring personally owned mobile devices to work place and using it to access company resources like email, file servers and databases as well as their personal applications and data.

Vodafone Secure Device Manager provides IT managers a management console which allows them to remotely manage security policies, device settings, certificates, applications, operating system etc, he added.

Clients would be charged at Rs. 175 per device per month and they can scale depending on the requirement.

It allows users to remotely lock or wipe all information from their smart devices in case the device is lost.

Asked how the company would compete with IT services firms which typically provide such solutions, Chopra said Vodafone's reach and capability would help the company service their clients better.

Business Services, which constitutes about 10 percent of Vodafone's revenues in the country, over voice and data services over wireless and fixedline networks. It has over 3.6 million corporate customers in India.

According to industry estimates, companies spend 2-5 percent of their IT budgets on security of devices.

While earlier IT security was limited to desktops and laptops, increasing popularity of mobile workforce and usage of smartphones and tablet PCs is forcing IT administrators to seriously consider securing corporate information and applications used on such mobile devices.

Also, the increasing trend of BYOD is also fuelling demand for securing these devices to protect sensitive corporate data.