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Complete Mobile Device Lifecycle Management

News Release


Symantec Delivers Complete Mobile Device Lifecycle Management


Mobile Solutions Combine Security and Management Capabilities to Help Customers

Protect and Manage Corporate Data on Mobile Devices

AUCKLAND – Symantec Corp. (Nasdaq: SYMC) today announced its mobile security and management strategy, including three products to help organisations secure and manage data on the rising number of mobile devices in the enterprise. Symantec’s mobile strategy focuses on the effective integration of its mobile security and management solutions to help customers reduce downtime, increase user productivity, improve response time and provide protection and management throughout the mobile device lifecycle – from provisioning and management to security and eventual device retirement.

“As mobile devices become more sophisticated, provide greater corporate access and store more data, organisations require greater control and management to protect corporate information and ensure user productivity – all while reducing costs,” said Art Gilliland, vice president, Enterprise Security Group, Symantec. “Our mobile strategy is designed to protect and manage data wherever it resides and automate procurement and provisioning, provide ongoing maintenance and protection and quickly retire the mobile devices if they are lost, damaged, stolen or replaced.”

Having a comprehensive mobile strategy in place will become increasingly important as mobile devices continue to permeate the business environment. IDC research indicates that the number of worldwide converged mobile device shipments will reach more than 167 million by the end of 2009 and forecasts that it will increase to more than 291 million by 2013, representing a 14 percent Compound Annual Growth Rate(1). As more mobile devices access corporate networks, often through unprotected pathways, malware writers and criminals will use this window to gain access to sensitive data.

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“Mobile devices and the growing number of people using them are becoming a bigger target for unauthorised and potentially harmful software, including worms, viruses and spyware,” said Sean Ryan, Research Analyst, Mobile Enterprise Software at IDC. “As the sheer number of mobile devices continues to increase and demands on IT continue to increase, the need for organisations to secure and manage these devices and the information on them is significantly elevated.”

Symantec’s mobile management and security strategy follows a lifecycle model, provides tight integration and aligns with the broad Symantec portfolio. As part of its mobile strategy, Symantec is now offering three new products to help customers mitigate risk, manage complexity, control costs, automate processes and address compliance concerns with efficiency and cost savings.

• Symantec Endpoint Protection Mobile Edition 6.0 provides protection for mobile devices against malicious threats and unauthorised access to sensitive corporate information by utilising award-winning antivirus technology, an advanced firewall and SMS anti-spam protection. Symantec Endpoint Protection Mobile Edition helps ensure both the protection of the data on the mobile devices and compliance with internal and external security requirements.

• Symantec Network Access Control Mobile Edition 6.0 works with Symantec Endpoint Protection Mobile Edition to enforce compliancy with security policies to ensure that only secure, policy-compliant devices can access the network and email on Microsoft Exchange. Symantec Network Access Control Mobile Edition provides client-based integrity checking and centralised alerting of device integrity status. Assessment of host integrity status for mobile devices helps organisations ensure that they are able to consistently enforce IT policy. Centralised logging, reporting and alerting further enables organisations to proactively monitor the status of managed devices.

• Symantec Mobile Management 7.0 increases IT efficiency with over-the-air deployment of applications and updates, improves end user productivity by managing mobile device health and integrates with Symantec mobile security products to manage and secure mobile devices throughout their lifecycle. Symantec Mobile Management provides powerful remote assistance capabilities, real-time system management, granular software delivery and self repair, and complete visibility into the mobile environment.

Symantec’s mobile security and management solutions are built on the Symantec Management Platform, which provides unified enterprise-class management of desktops, laptops, servers and mobile devices. This enables administrators to centrally define and distribute security policies to mobile devices over-the-air. The Symantec Management Platform also provides product integration to enable unified security and management of mobile devices from a single management console, thus reducing complexity, mitigating risk and lowering costs. Integration with Symantec LiveUpdate further helps to ensure timely updates of content.

A recent Enterprise Strategy Group survey commissioned by Symantec indicates that mobile devices are used by more employees, for more types of applications, to access more types of data – including confidential data – than ever before. Key findings from the survey of IT managers conducted in October 2009 include the following:

• 86 percent of respondents believe that mobile devices are either “critical” or “important” for business process and productivity.

• More than one-third responded that employees with mobile devices can access, receive and store company confidential data, customer data, regulated data and intellectual property.

• 80 percent of organisations polled believe that it is “critical” or “important” to have an integrated management and security solution for mobile devices.

• 70 percent said that both mobile device and desktop/laptop PC security are managed by the same group within the organisation.

Licensing and Availability

Symantec Endpoint Protection Mobile Edition and Symantec Network Access Control Mobile Edition support Windows Mobile, Windows CE and Symbian mobile devices while the Symantec Mobile Management solution offers support for Windows Mobile and Windows CE mobile devices. The solutions are now available and can be purchased directly from Symantec or through Symantec’s worldwide network of value-added authorised resellers, distributors and systems integrators. For more information, please visit http://www.symantec.com/business/sep_mobile_edition, http://www.symantec.com/business/network-access-control-mobile-edition and http://www.symantec.com/business/mobile-management.

About Business Solutions from Symantec

Symantec helps organisations secure and manage their information-driven world with security management, endpoint security, messaging security, application security, server management, endpoint management and server virtualisation solutions.

About Symantec

Symantec is a global leader in providing security, storage and systems management solutions to help consumers and organisations secure and manage their information-driven world. Our software and services protect against more risks at more points, more completely and efficiently, enabling confidence wherever information is used or stored. More information is available at www.symantec.com.


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NOTE TO EDITORS: If you would like additional information on Symantec Corporation and its products, please visit the Symantec News Room at http://www.symantec.com/news.


Symantec and the Symantec Logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Symantec Corporation or its affiliates in the U.S. and other countries. Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.

(1) IDC, "Worldwide Converged Mobile Device 2009-2013 Forecast Update: September 2009," Doc # 220051, September 2009

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