MobileIron, best known for its MDM tech, is moving into IoT security

MobileIron, best known for its MDM (mobile device management technology) just announced that it has formed an Internet of Things (IoT) division which will focus on building an end-to-end chain of trust from sensor to app to gateway to cloud to network. The company also announced that Santhosh Nair has joined MobileIron as VP IoT to lead the division. He will work closely with MobileIron co-founder and CTO Suresh Batchu. MobileIron is targeting having an IoT product ready for sale later this year. Bain & Co estimate that by 2020 IoT vendor revenue could exceed $470 billion.

The announcement was made at MobileIron's Analyst Day. A live audio webcast of the presentation may be accessed by visiting the Investors page of the MobileIron corporate website at http://investors.mobileiron.com/. A replay of the presentation will be available for one year following the presentation.

Many existing IoT systems have significant limitations because they are highly customized and inflexible, which makes them hard to configure and expensive to maintain over the system's lifecycle. MobileIron's IoT platform will be designed to:
    •    Use a standards-based, open systems approach for interoperability;
    •    Deliver scalable, automated lifecycle management to mitigate against the possibility of human errors;
    •    Protect the integrity and the security of petabytes of moving data; and
    •    Provide continuity for systems that are too critical to fail.

"There's been a lot of hype around the Internet of Things and most of it is just that: hype. The mistake that a lot of companies make with IoT is that they start by looking at the problem from the sensor up," said Barry Mainz, President & CEO, MobileIron. "Our customer-focused approach is exactly the opposite. Over the last year, we have worked hand-in-hand with our customers and global operator partners to understand how companies want to use IoT and what challenges they face. As a result, we have defined specific use cases in healthcare, energy, manufacturing, and automotive where we can help our customers. This creates a tremendous opportunity for us."

MobileIron say the Internet of Things is the next frontier of the Information Age. IoT automates core business workflows by digitizing the collection of data in order to gather insights that drive physical action. Enterprise computing happens at the network edge and in the cloud to reduce latency. The consequences of inaccurate information or inappropriate action can be costly (supply chain disruption), dangerous (a pipeline leak), or deadly (medical errors). In IoT, scale and security are critical. MobileIron's goal is to provide a unified platform and a single pane of glass to secure and manage IoT services.

MobileIron's IoT solution applies the company's software innovation to this new market opportunity. MobileIron's three-point architecture of policy engine, edge client, and network gateway is directly applicable to the challenges of IoT deployments.

Administrators automate rules using the policy engine. The edge client enforces actions on the IoT gateway and monitors security posture. The network gateway ensures that IoT data is transmitted securely and not susceptible to man-in-the-middle attacks. And all these actions are done at massive scale.

Joining MobileIron to lead the new division is Santhosh Nair, who joins from Wind River, an Intel company, where he was the Vice President & General Manager of the IoT business unit and managed key customer relationships across broad markets.

"When I met with the team at MobileIron, I was impressed with their insights on the Internet of Things and I'm excited to turn these insights into execution," said Santhosh Nair, VP, IoT, MobileIron. "Enterprise endpoint security is critical to the successful adoption of technologies for the Internet of Things and many of MobileIron's engineering innovations are directly applicable to IoT. I believe we have a big opportunity and a huge market lead."

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Internet of Things | MobileIron