At the end of 2013 there were more mobile devices than people on earth, or so says SAP, according to an article from earlier this year, 50 Incredible WiFi Tech Statistics That Businesses Must Know.
Let’s think about this for a second. That means more than 7 Billion devices are currently connecting to mobile networks around the world. And by 2020, we expect that to more than triple - with the majority using some sort of wireless access to connect.
Mobility isn’t a fad. It isn’t just great big marketing themes like BYOD and Internet of Things. This is the future of communication. Of work. Of teaching. Maybe even of dating :-). A recent Morgan Stanley study said that 91% of Americans have their mobile phone within reach 24/7.
But what it really comes down to, as people have all these devices, work on these devices, play on these devices - is how are you going to manage them all?
The answer, of course, is that you can’t. At least, not if you keep managing devices the way you always have. In this age of mobility and faster access to information, keeping corporate data secure becomes even more important - safeguarding against a device left unsecured, or granted more access than should be permitted. And who knows what your competitors will have access to? Or malicious users who are trolling for consumer information?
It’s not like the recent events at the big box stores took place like it did in War Games back in the 80s… hackers in this day and age find ways to use devices with existing access to exploit information. On the other 
side of the spectrum, employees are clamoring for access to the wireless network - not just to do work things on their consumer devices, but because it’s cheaper than paying for a data plan. Or they’re trying to be more fit and want to connect their fitness tracker for progress updates throughout the day. With the job market as hot as it is, “wireless access for personal devices” has become a benefit employers are offering to their employees.
It’s not like IT teams are getting 5x the number of staff to accommodate the 5x the number of devices they need to manage. So what gives?
Well, Aerohive is pleased to once again pave the way to Simpli-Fi with updates to our ID Manager access management platform.
Employers can now offer SELF-SERVICE guest, BYOD, and employee personal device access to the network. More importantly, this self-service access is simple to access, simple to configure, and SECURE. While traditional username/passwords credentials are available, the highly scalable, flexible, and security offered by Aerohive’s own PPSK is really the key to this functionality.
Employees can easily sponsor their own or guest devices to join the network, grant them a key good for a 
specified amount of time, and then IT will have COMPLETE CONTROL over what that can device can do on the network. Not just VLAN or SSID, but granular application controls. Tunneling policies. Infrastructure access. Everything that device does on the network can be monitored. Access can be revoked for a specific device or set of devices with a single click. And you can do it all without any complex configuration of certificates, supplicants, or multiple access methods based on type of user/device.
All of this, and something even better - it’s cloud-enabled. That means you need just one no matter how many locations you have, how many devices show up on your network, or how many employees you want to allow to access it.
Oh, and don’t forget the app, available in the app store this October. :-) In fact, all of the info on the app and the rest of today's announcement on onboarding and management of personal and BYO Devices in the enterprise can be found here.
This is the mobile-first world, folks. And Aerohive is your source for connected intelligence.