As mobile adoption expands in the enterprise, companies are increasingly investing in mobile application management (MAM) platforms to control which applications are users install on devices and mobile device management (MDM) to manage mobile environments more holistically. Vendors are rushing to the market to offer new products and products for mobile management, but according to a new report by IDC, it’s not enough.

IDC asserts that the time for single purpose mobile management solutions may be coming to an end as enterprises demand more comprehensive solutions that incorporate both MAM and MDM features. This merger of features into single platform that can manage applications and devices will spawn a new market which IDC refers to as mobile enterprise management (MEM). The MEM market will include products with traditional MDM or MAM features as well as the new combined MDM-MAM solutions.

The new market has a potential to be enormous. According to analysts, the MEM market, this includes current MDM and MAM offerings, generated $444.6 million in revenue. However, they forecast revenue will increase at a compound annual growth rate of 31.8 percent from 2012 to 2015. This will result in a MEM market of $1.8 billion by 2016. Much of this growth will occur in the Americas, but vendors will begin to increase their focus on Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) and Asia/Pacific and likely see significant increases in adoption in these regions.

Preparing for MEM the Enterprise

The enterprise mobile market is continuing to evolve rapidly. However, in most cases IT leaders cannot afford to “wait and see” what the ultimate shape and composition of the market will be. The volume and diversity of mobile end points in most businesses is continuing to expand and organizations must manage them now, now when the MEM market finally matures.

When evaluating new options, technology leaders would be wise to consider perspective vendors product scope and release roadmaps. Does the vendor offer solutions for application and device management? Is there an intersection of the product lines or new platform combining by features planned? If an intersection is planned, will the platform upgrade be backwards compatible? Understanding this information could help avoid making an expensive investment in a platform that is going to quickly become outdated.