A blog by Oleg Shilovitsky
Information & Comments about Engineering and Manufacturing Software

Enterprise App Store: There is an App… for what?

Enterprise App Store: There is an App… for what?
Oleg
Oleg
11 September, 2012 | 2 min for reading

I’m sure you are familiar with a famous Apple slogan – there is an app for that. We are in love of our apps and use them a lot. The idea of Apps was picked up by enterprise software developers as well and popularized. I believe the idea is good. In one of my posts last year, I discussed this topic – PLM Enterprise App Store: Bad Idea or Future Promise? Since last year, I’ve seen how the idea of enterprise app store was adopted by marketing enterprise software companies in ERP, CRM and some other ideas. Autodesk popularized this approach in recently released PLM 360 cloud product.

I’m still learning this topic. Few days ago, my attention was caught by the following article – 400,000 apps in the App Store have never been downloaded says report. The statistic is really amazing – 60% of apps never been downloaded even one time.

Let’s leave the problem of app store and consumer app developers aside and think about enterprise app store. The problem of App usage made me think about past PDM toolkits. If you spent enough time if PDM/PLM industry, you probably remember the era of PDM toolkits. It allowed to developers and service companies to assembly and configure a specific PDM system for any needs. Sounds like a good idea? However, we know that PDM toolkits ended up with high level of implementation complexity, cost and migration issues. You had too many feature, functions, bolts, nuts…  I think, enterprise apps can introduce a new problem – how a person in organization can have a right set of apps? Which can be translated into two things – focus on right applications and balance the level of granularity.

What is my conclusion? I think, we are all excited about consumerization and the promise to project a success of mobile devices and web to enterprise software and PLM. Even so, we need to be aware about potential drawbacks. I want to quote Albert Einstein – Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler. Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

Recent Posts

Also on BeyondPLM

4 6
1 October, 2009

30 September was time for 100’000 happy individuals to get Google Wave invitation. Even I’m not part of these 100’000,...

3 May, 2013

(Updated with some modification. May 3, 2013 @9:42a) In my yesterday post, I’ve been talking about PDM software, obvious value...

27 June, 2008

I’d like to share my view on V6 technologies Dassault Systems presented last week on our technological forum DevCon 2008. If...

4 January, 2025

As we close the chapter on 2024, it’s time to reflect on some of the most engaging discussions that resonated...

3 March, 2014

The importance of Bill of Material in product development and manufacturing hardly can be undervalued. BOM is a cornerstone of...

20 May, 2009

I’d like to discuss the relationship in the organization between two major classes of software – PLM (CAD, CAE, PDM) and...

20 March, 2009

 I’d like to start  a wide topic for discussion – BOM. Yes, Bill of Material. This may seem like an...

1 August, 2017

Dear Friends, It is very sad, but I’m going through some serious family emergency. I will dedicate myself to family...

25 February, 2011

CAD and PLM world is extremely competitive. The decision process in the manufacturing industry is not fast. Companies are spending...

Blogroll

To the top