Last week was the Sybase Mobile Enterprise event in Amsterdam, just like previous years it drew a good number of attendees. Registrations numbered over 280 of Europe's Mobility Visionaries, divided by the following countries...

Netherlands 37%, Germany 20%, UK 16%, Denmark 7%, Belgium 6%, Spain 3%, France 3%, Switzerland 2%, Macedonia 2%, Norway 1%, Sweden 1%, Italy 1%

Mike Oliver, EMEA Mobility Marketing Manager for Sybase opened by articulating a great overview of Mobility, including a reminder that "long standing products are as relevant now as ever before... check out SQLAnywhere". With regard to hardware Mike pointed out that Motorola was in the exhibit area showing a very cool Windows Mobile device for the Enterprise, which he was trying out and continued with stating the increasing use of iPhone and iPad in the Enterprise ( not forgetting the future growth of Android). He also reminded the listening attendees that recently the SAP Executive board voted for Sybase to lead the Mobility business, strategy and execution for SAP.

The first guest speaker of the day followed on stage, Andy McBain of Motorola. Interesting parts from Andy's presentation were Motorola Stats, that their average R&D investment is $4 Billion and they have more than 22,000 patents. Motorola also believe that the Mobile Edge is expanding, from shop floor to corner office, from inside to outside the four walls. I totally agreed with Andy's statement that Enterprise Mobility increases Mobile Worker Productivity and Decision Making. With regard to devices Motorola devices fall into 3 Use-Cases... Task Workers, Knowledge Workers & White Collar spaces, and continue to supply Durable devices as you would expect. There was a quick mention of the Motorola MEUI (Motorola Enterprise User Interface) and the news that their R&D are looking heavily at HTML5. Will this take away the OS pain?

Our second guest speaker was from T-Systems.. Dr Marcus Hacke explained T-Systems Key drivers for Mobile Enterprise... Consumerization, followed by Convergence and Optimization. Dr Hacke then went on to cover key success factor for the adoption of Mobile Enterprise: Connected Life and Work on one device, also not to lose sight of the full value chain for the Mobile Enterprise. Interestingly he closed in explaining that Enterprises need independence of technology and architecture. Roll on The SAP Unwired Platform.

I really enjoy these events, where I can get face-to-face contact with the 'shapers and movers' in Enterprise Mobility as well as customers and partners. During such conversations it became obvious that what was greatly appreciated throughout the day, was the wealth of real-life examples from Motorola, Sybase, Neo Partners, T-Systems, Mobility Architects and MSC Mobile. They were all sharing their experiences, some on how the SAP UnWired platform was able to lower the cost and complexity of Mobility, leading enterprises to invest in strategic platform choice.

We were also lucky enough to be addressed by James Naftel Product Manager for Afaria on the subject of Key Mobility Trends - Consumerisation, Cloud, Enterprise Apps, Integrated solutions and Developer Creativity. James explained 3 parts to Mobile Device Management... Provisioning, Production and Decommission. Looking at Apple's MDM Protocol and how #Afaria integrates them for Security and Management of iOS devices, then onto Google's Management and Security for Android, which is slightly behind others in functionality due to the OS, but will surely change next year. Last but by no means least, Tim Roberts of Sybase continued covering Mobility as a Service (MAAS), which is a Business Model that can be supported by Afaria

I continued my 'show of hands', which I started in the Nordic Roadshow which again interestingly showed that over half the attendees at the event were using iPhone and over half of that number had an iPad. For sure iOS devices currently rule across Europe... close second, Android, Windows Mobile, BlackBerry and Symbian