At the end of October 2015, the research firm eMarketer published an article which stated that 39.5 million adults in the US will use wearable technology. That number represents an almost 58% increase from 2014. And the research firm expects the amount of wearable technology users in the US to grow even further – by 2018, eMarketer expects 81.7 million people will utilize some form of wearable technology.
How do things look on the enterprise side? Cloud CRM provider Salesforce.com carried out a survey of its own between the end of February and the beginning of March 2015. Researchers focused on 500 full time business professionals who currently use or plan to implement some form of wearable technology. The report’s authors expressed confidence that wearable technology adoption will dramatically increase within the enterprise because it offers such incredible business benefits.
Wearables in the Enterprise: The Current Landscape
No researchers have published reports documenting the rate of adoption for wearable technology within the enterprise. Wearable devices are still very much within their infancy. Furthermore, consumers seem to be spearheading the proliferation of wearable technology, not businesses.
Why is that the case? There are a few factors holding back wearable tech from taking off in the enterprise. The first factor is that the current stock of wearable devices on the market doesn’t have many apps that are built for businesses. How are companies going to derive value from a smart watch or smart glasses if their employees can’t utilize them for tasks such as analyzing data or improving the customer experience?
A second factor is the cost of an individual wearable device. Currently, the Apple Sport Watch retails for $349. That’s quite a bit of money to spend for a device that doesn’t run very many business apps. While sport and activity trackers are cheaper, their utility to the enterprise is little if any.
The third factor for low enterprise adoption rates of wearable technology is security. More to the point, these devices aren’t built with enterprise security needs in mind. Why would a company invest in wearable devices if they expose it to hackers and other criminals?
What Needs to Change?
How can wearable device manufacturers convince the enterprise that their products are the right fit for companies?
They need to make the business case that wearable tech can enable firms to operate in a leaner, more agile manner. However, that won’t be possible if wearable device manufacturers, and the businesses which create their operating systems, don’t dramatically increase the number of enterprise apps available.
Secondly, the cost of wearable devices needs to drop in order to make them more palatable to companies. This might happen as a result of greater consumer adoption of items such as smart watches, although it is also taking consumers time to see the value in wearable technology.
Finally, security is a great concern for the enterprise. Wearable devices need to protect sensitive corporate data thoroughly and effectively before businesses will adopt them on a wide scale.
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