Yesterday Microsoft VP Brad Anderson, corporate VP for Windows Server and System Center, provided insight into the future of System Center Configuration Manager (ConfigMgr or SCCM) via the Endpoint Zone: Episode 2!. Brad restated Nadella's plan to make Microsoft fit for a "mobile-first and cloud-first world" and many of his statements hint to Windows Intune (soon to be Microsoft Intune) eventually replacing SCCM. In this post I attempt to look into SCCM's future based on Microsoft's actions and stated vision and break down what it means for SCCM professionals.
I've been working with Windows Intune since it was in beta. When I wrote Windows Intune and SCCM Start Merging two years ago, I didn't foresee SCCM being replaced, but a lot has happened since. Here are a couple important things that have occurred in my opinion. The Economist magazine summarizes the first one: "Microsoft, the king of the desktop age, has been dethroned by the smartphone revolution". The second was summarized by Brad in February: "Windows Intune is ConfigMgr from the Cloud".
Windows Phone is in survival mode. Because there's so much at stake, I believe Microsoft is not ready to call it a sunk cost or adapt and become agile by breaking its different business units into different companies like others are doing (in the last few days Ebay announced that it is spinning off its Paypal unit; Symantec is breaking into a security and an information management company; HP is breaking into a computer and printer company and an "everything else" company). Instead, Microsoft is tweaking other products and business units such as Windows 10 and its cloud services to attempt to rescue Windows Phone.
As explained by Brad in the Endpoint Zone, Windows 10 will allow Microsoft to have one Windows for all flavors: phone, tablet, PC and Xbox; from no screen (embedded) to large screens. Develop an application for Windows 10 and it can be used across all Windows devices (hoping that more applications will be available for Windows Phone and that the Windows Phone interface will look familiar to Windows users).
Brad said that Windows 10 will also come "natively manageable from the get-go" with one agent for Intune and SCCM. If using Intune, Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) of Windows phone devices should seem simpler to IT decision-makers than other EMM solutions. Containers for Windows (native in Windows 10), iOS and Android will make it easier for Intune and SCCM to stay away from personal data.
Brad was asked in the Endpoint Zone why Windows Intune was not mentioned in the recent Gartner's EMM magic quadrant report. Brad responded by saying that he had to make a decision on whether to take SCCM and host it in the cloud or rebuild the EMM solution. He decided to rebuild the EMM solution as a legitimate 100% cloud-based architecture "rather than taking the existing product and [hosting] it, which would limit our agility in the future". He said that the architecture needs to lend itself so anybody in the team can update the solution many times a day and that "we could never do that with ConfigMgr". He said this was a strategic long-term investment and that Intune should be mentioned in the report next time.
Another question fielded by Brad in the Endpoint Zone was "When do we use SCCM and when do we use Intune? He said "Rich, sophisticated PC management" will remain an on-premises workload for a while in the future (such as heavy software distribution and operating system deployment). He has the world view that enterprise mobility should be delivered from a cloud service and that clients have a choice: use SCCM and attach to Intune or manage systems entirely in the cloud with Intune. Brad said, "Today, a lot of our mobile device management investment is going heavy into Intune" and "all of rich PC management will remain in ConfigMgr and over time will migrate them to Intune". Brad has always had the view that mobile device management (MDM) and PC management need to converge and that the majority of the conversion will occur in the ConfigMgr team.
Although the SCCM product is a growing business for Microsoft and is getting more features in its next version, it seems to be in the way of its mobile-first and cloud-first long term vision, and its long term vision may be a matter of survival. This vision may get away with current successful products or services (as happened with TechNet, MMS and TechEd). Think that SCCM will not go away because of the "rich, sophisticated PC management" such as operating system deployment (OSD)? Just as SCCM now has a cloud-based distribution point, Intune could, in a few years, have an on-premises Intune server with a role or roles (such as local content provider) to assist managing those systems that are either not connected to the cloud for security reasons or need to download an OS image or large files:
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A company may need to take painful decisions to ensure its long-term profitability, which is the bottom line. Perhaps having merged the SCCM and Intune product teams, now knowing that device management investments are going heavy into Intune, was one of the reasons Mr. SCCM himself, Wally Mead, left Microsoft. In his own words: "the product group had changed, Microsoft had changed..."
So what does this mean for us? For SCCM professionals, we either trust that Microsoft will get it right and embrace Intune or find an alternative. Brad said the following in the Endpoint Zone: "When Microsoft thinks about helping SCCM administrators enhance and progress their careers, Intune-ConfigMgr integration is one of the ways to do it". And if we are not yet convinced, Brad gave us this message in June: "For SCCM admins dead-set against using the cloud, I would say you are missing out." As a result, I will start writing more blog posts about Intune.
I've been working with Windows Intune since it was in beta. When I wrote Windows Intune and SCCM Start Merging two years ago, I didn't foresee SCCM being replaced, but a lot has happened since. Here are a couple important things that have occurred in my opinion. The Economist magazine summarizes the first one: "Microsoft, the king of the desktop age, has been dethroned by the smartphone revolution". The second was summarized by Brad in February: "Windows Intune is ConfigMgr from the Cloud".
Windows Phone is in survival mode. Because there's so much at stake, I believe Microsoft is not ready to call it a sunk cost or adapt and become agile by breaking its different business units into different companies like others are doing (in the last few days Ebay announced that it is spinning off its Paypal unit; Symantec is breaking into a security and an information management company; HP is breaking into a computer and printer company and an "everything else" company). Instead, Microsoft is tweaking other products and business units such as Windows 10 and its cloud services to attempt to rescue Windows Phone.
As explained by Brad in the Endpoint Zone, Windows 10 will allow Microsoft to have one Windows for all flavors: phone, tablet, PC and Xbox; from no screen (embedded) to large screens. Develop an application for Windows 10 and it can be used across all Windows devices (hoping that more applications will be available for Windows Phone and that the Windows Phone interface will look familiar to Windows users).
Brad said that Windows 10 will also come "natively manageable from the get-go" with one agent for Intune and SCCM. If using Intune, Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) of Windows phone devices should seem simpler to IT decision-makers than other EMM solutions. Containers for Windows (native in Windows 10), iOS and Android will make it easier for Intune and SCCM to stay away from personal data.
Brad was asked in the Endpoint Zone why Windows Intune was not mentioned in the recent Gartner's EMM magic quadrant report. Brad responded by saying that he had to make a decision on whether to take SCCM and host it in the cloud or rebuild the EMM solution. He decided to rebuild the EMM solution as a legitimate 100% cloud-based architecture "rather than taking the existing product and [hosting] it, which would limit our agility in the future". He said that the architecture needs to lend itself so anybody in the team can update the solution many times a day and that "we could never do that with ConfigMgr". He said this was a strategic long-term investment and that Intune should be mentioned in the report next time.
Another question fielded by Brad in the Endpoint Zone was "When do we use SCCM and when do we use Intune? He said "Rich, sophisticated PC management" will remain an on-premises workload for a while in the future (such as heavy software distribution and operating system deployment). He has the world view that enterprise mobility should be delivered from a cloud service and that clients have a choice: use SCCM and attach to Intune or manage systems entirely in the cloud with Intune. Brad said, "Today, a lot of our mobile device management investment is going heavy into Intune" and "all of rich PC management will remain in ConfigMgr and over time will migrate them to Intune". Brad has always had the view that mobile device management (MDM) and PC management need to converge and that the majority of the conversion will occur in the ConfigMgr team.
Although the SCCM product is a growing business for Microsoft and is getting more features in its next version, it seems to be in the way of its mobile-first and cloud-first long term vision, and its long term vision may be a matter of survival. This vision may get away with current successful products or services (as happened with TechNet, MMS and TechEd). Think that SCCM will not go away because of the "rich, sophisticated PC management" such as operating system deployment (OSD)? Just as SCCM now has a cloud-based distribution point, Intune could, in a few years, have an on-premises Intune server with a role or roles (such as local content provider) to assist managing those systems that are either not connected to the cloud for security reasons or need to download an OS image or large files:
So what does this mean for us? For SCCM professionals, we either trust that Microsoft will get it right and embrace Intune or find an alternative. Brad said the following in the Endpoint Zone: "When Microsoft thinks about helping SCCM administrators enhance and progress their careers, Intune-ConfigMgr integration is one of the ways to do it". And if we are not yet convinced, Brad gave us this message in June: "For SCCM admins dead-set against using the cloud, I would say you are missing out." As a result, I will start writing more blog posts about Intune.