Macs in 80% of US businesses; VM, reliability key
updated 08:05 pm EDT, Thu June 26, 2008
Macs in US business
Apple's exposure in the corporate world is exploding according to a recent survey by Yankee Group Research, finding that Macs reside in one form or another at almost 80-percent of US companies. According to Computerworld, the figure has almost doubled in two years, with 47-percent of corporate IT departments claiming the use of Macs in early 2006. The increase comes mainly from Apple's well-documented reliability, as well as the virtualization capabilities that the Intel migration has opened.
Yankee Group researcher Laura DiDio noted that the feat is most impressive, due to a lack of an official concerted effort to breach the market. "Apple has a beachhead in business. Where it once had just 1-to-2% market share in corporate, now they're up to 8-to-10%," wrote Didio in the findings.
DiDio said that 21-percent of firms reported that they have deployed 50 or more Apple units, quipping that Apple has "graduated to the big league." 28-percent of all businesses polled reported that Windows is run in their offices through a virtual machine, such as Parallels or VMware Fusion, while 22-percent say that they use Boot Camp to dual-boot the systems.
While most businesses are willing to integrate Apple into their networks, Didio notes that few would be willing to switch outright, due to some saying the company's server management software and support programs are not up to the task.
Didio summarizes that Macs are now being accepted into business, rather than "let in" or worked around, presenting corporate customers with a viable choice when it comes to computing hardware.
Businesses that hated Mac
06/26, 08:28pm reply
...now come crawling to Apple.
Horsepoo!!!
Banned
Joined: Jun 2003
99%
06/26, 10:37pm reply
of businesses run Windows
gitcypher
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Jul 2007
lol
06/26, 11:04pm reply
gitcypher, I guess that is the reason for $180 billion lost every year due to insecure software (mentioned in forbes article 2008/06/26 ).
dliup
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Jan 2006
There goes macnn again
06/27, 02:09am reply
Adding a zero to the headline and greatly distorting the facts... ;-)
As much as I would like to believe this, I do find it very hard to believe. 80% in the Fortune top 500? Maybe... but of all businesses? How many independent and small mom-n-pop businesses out there run macs? Most of those businesses run the cheapest pc they can find.
csimon2
Junior Member
Joined: Aug 2000
counting?
06/27, 08:04am reply
Do they count iPods as being "Macs"?
testudo
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Aug 2001
nice
06/27, 11:40am reply
It's a survey of 700 global IT administrators and C-level executives, so more than the fortune 500, but not small businesses. I wonder if they had a minimum size company they surveyed. From the article:
"Other enterprise IT administrators said they had gone virtual in an attempt to sidestep the management overhead required for Windows on physical PCs. "Many of our Windows developers have switched to XP and Vista virtual machines running on Macintosh hardware to circumvent the downtime they experienced with the unreliability — viruses, spyware, disruptive automatic updates — of Windows XP running on PCs," one IT manager told DiDio in a follow-up interview."
elroth
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Jul 2006
Don't forget iPhones...
06/27, 11:44am reply
but yeah, iPod and iPhone counting has to be it. Like csimon2 I also find it hard to believe, as much as I would like to believe. If Macs reside in one form or another in 80% of businesses, why am I so super lucky to always visit a business in the 20% category that doesn't have a Mac in one form or another?
MeandmyMac
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Feb 2008
Ok, 80% of real companies
06/27, 11:47am reply
I think this is significant as these companies upgrade their hardware fairly often. I'm sorry but if a mom and pop shop is still running windows 95 or earlier on a really old pc, they are hardly a factor in market share given that they have not contributed to market share in a decade.
Install base != marketshare.
aristotles
Senior User
Joined: Jul 2004
only 1
06/27, 11:54am reply
@csimon2
all it takes is to have 1 mac in the office and they can claim they run Macs. So 80% of businesses have A Mac (or more). Not that they use 80% macs 20% pcs.
Chris Paveglio
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Joined: Jul 2002