We are IBM business partners, so we use this for testing before we demonstrate it to the customer. So, I don’t have exposure to the product as an end user.
I’d rather have exposure to the product as a technical salesperson, understanding the product and its features and how it is going to help the engineers and the customers in protecting their infrastructure.
It is for remote work, where portable devices are used by corporate users. If it is used for personal use, there are separate silos maintained. In case a specific user doesn’t report, there is a feature in MaaS360 to wipe out the office information from that device.
We have a few key features, and there is a clear native integration of TeamViewer, which is actually helpful instead of using unauthorized screen desktop sharing applications. It is better to use TeamViewer, which is integrated with MaaS360, where you don’t have any threat from illegal issues. These are a few key features.
We have some challenges. If we look at the challenges we face in the market, there are a few products like Sophos, where there are features of MaaS360, and the IBM EDR product, ReaQta. So, there are features from both ReaQta and MaaS360 available in Sophos, as well as a few other products, which we have challenges in replacing.
MaaS360 definitely caters to a few of the requirements, but when someone is going for a solution, all the features are not available in MaaS360. It is like a combo, MaaS360, and IBM ReaQta, that is, EDR, ReaQta. Both of them, together as a combo plan, actually offer a very good proposition in terms of market competitors.
There are a few products like Sophos and another product which have features from both endpoint detection and response and mobile device management. Because we have two different products with those features, we face challenges in proposing a particular product for the client. It is like a marketing challenge.
The way other competitor products are available in the market. So it is better to have a different positive team, but, again, to remain in competition and have better scalability. So, IBM needs to integrate a few features that the competitors have in their products. No doubt, this is a different product, MaaS360. We call it MDM. We call it endpoint mobile device management. Then we call it different names that MaaS360 falls into.
But when we are talking about competitor products, to remain in the competition, you need to have features that others provide. IBM surely has those features in other products, but not in MaaS360.
The only challenge was replacing already existing competitor products with MaaS360. So, that’s the only area where we struggle because they always come with those requirements that they are already getting in the competitor’s product, which is not available in IBM’s MaaS360. So this product lacks some features, like Unified Endpoint Management.
