What are MDM systems, what are their functions and applications, what is distinguishing them from EMM and UEM, and what is driving their high relevance and growing demand for them in various industries.

With the rise in popularity of remote working, mobile devices have become essential for most organizations. Employees daily use their smartphones, tablets and laptops for completing a wide range of job tasks. This highly complex and diverse fleet of devices requires some form of control in order to ensure the proper performance and security of these devices. Very often, business sensitive information may be accessed through corporate mobile devices, and many business processes generally rely on them. Therefore, any failure, hacking, theft or loss of a mobile device may cause severe problems for a company.

In this respect, MDM systems, i.e. mobile device management systems, are gaining high importance as a toolset helping companies to run their operations efficiently. It is not surprising that according to the analysts’ predictions an average annual growth rate of the MDM systems market will be around 26% up until 2029. Today let's discuss what MDM systems are and how the companies may use them in their work.

MDM (Mobile Device Management) systems are intended for monitoring, controlling and protecting mobile devices connected to a corporate information infrastructure. Such systems may incorporate both personal and company-owned smartphones, tablets and laptops running on different operating systems.

Essentially, MDM systems represent a combination of applications, settings, corporate policies and certificates, as well as a server infrastructure. Their main purpose is to enable easier device support, higher device security and functional features meeting the company’s needs. Still, a matter of ensuring proper flexibility in using a device necessary for the productive work of employees is also important.

Today, most often SaaS solutions are used for MDM deployment, but along with them other systems exist that may run internally on the company’s infrastructure (on-premises). Usually, the company's IT team installs an MDM agent on the devices of employees. The most advanced device management systems may also offer an option for remote users to install an MDM agent on their own.

When talking about MDM systems, noteworthy are two comparable solutions that feature similar functions: EMM (Enterprise Mobility Management) and UEM (Unified Endpoint Management). Let’s figure out what are the differences between them.

•    MDM in its classical sense focuses on managing mobile devices.

•    EMM is a further evolution of MDM with the extended functionality including application management and corporate content management on mobile devices.

•    UEM takes the idea even further forward. UEM enables the management of not only smartphones and tablets, but also other endpoint devices connected to the corporate infrastructure, including desktop computers, laptops, printers, IoT, and so on. In this way UEM systems support the most complete integration.

In practice, the distinctions between MDM, EMM and UEM are blurred, especially in the realm of modern solutions. Most commonly the term MDM is used as the most widespread, even though it might actually refer to EMM or UEM. Nevertheless, it is good to know all three terms to better understand the capabilities of modern systems.

Specific strategies and tactics for the use of MDM systems by the companies vary and depend on the area of company’s operation, its size, and the inherent features of its infrastructure. Below we discuss the main capabilities of device management systems and their basic use cases.

Device Inventory. MDM system stores all information about both company-owned devices and BYODs (Bring Your Own Device). Data about a device owner, its installed applications and settings, security level, current location and much more is collected in one place.

Automated Enrollment of New Devices. Most MDM solutions support effortless deployment of all necessary settings and applications on the endpoint devices in accordance with the company's policies.

Remote Maintenance. One of the most prominent features of an MDM system, which is particularly essential in the case of remote workers. It enables support staff to remotely update and troubleshoot the user devices and eliminate the issues.

Limitations and Configurations. MDM supports centralized configuration of all necessary settings (e.g. VPN, Wi-Fi) and restrictions on devices.

Application and Content Management. Through MDM the administrators get the ability to determine which applications can be installed on users' workplace devices and to update those applications. This use case integrates both app stores and remote software distribution, as well as a containerized “work mode” that separates personal and work-related applications.

Devices and Data Security. MDM helps companies to enforce security measures to protect the devices and the sensitive data they hold. For example, disk encryption may be applied to all devices. Some solutions may also provide secure containers that keep corporate data separate from personal data. Other important features to protect company devices and data include: email encryption, malicious website blocking, urging users to use robust passwords and trusted browsers. If a device is lost or stolen, it can be tracked and data can be deleted remotely to prevent information leakage.

As mentioned earlier, the global MDM market is growing rapidly and according to some forecasts will reach $22 billion by 2027. Cloud-based mobile device management solutions are dominating the market. In the recent years, MDM systems are increasingly being implemented not only by large enterprises, but also by small and mid-sized businesses. The use of MDM solutions in the areas of public significance, such as education and healthcare, is gaining momentum.