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Apple Announces 'Business Essentials' Service for Small Businesses

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Apple today announced the debut of Apple Business Essentials, a new subscription-based service that will offer device management like setup and onboarding, iCloud storage, and optional 24/7 access to Apple Support for small businesses with up to 500 employees.

apple business essentials
Apple Business Essentials will enable small businesses to easily configure, deploy, and manage Apple products from anywhere, and there will be an Apple Business Essentials app that employees can access to download corporate apps like Webex or Microsoft Word.

Within Apple Business Essentials, Collections enable IT personnel to configure settings and apps for individual users, groups, or devices. When employees sign in to their corporate or personally owned device with their work credentials, Collections automatically push settings such as VPN configurations and Wi-Fi passwords. In addition, Collections will install the new Apple Business Essentials app on each employee’s home screen, where they can download corporate apps assigned to them, such as Cisco Webex or Microsoft Word.

Apple Business Essentials is available today as a free beta for small businesses in the U.S. with up to 500 employees, and the service will be fully available in spring 2022. Pricing will range from $2.99 per user per month to $12.99 per user per month depending on the number of devices and the amount of iCloud storage each user needs.


There will be an option to add AppleCare+ to an Apple Business Essentials plan starting in spring 2022, and this will provide 24/7 access to Apple Support by phone, training for both IT administrators and employees, and up to two device repairs per plan each year. Employees will be able to initiate repairs directly from the Apple Business Essentials app, and an Apple-trained technician can arrive on site in as little as four hours.

Small businesses can sign up for Apple Business Essentials on Apple's website.

Top Rated Comments

DHagan4755 Avatar
DHagan4755
57 months ago
Looks like this might be fruits from the Fleetsmith acquisition last year. This is badly needed. As good as JAMF is, the fact that Apple hasn't itself provided management on par with Google or Microsoft has been an Achille's heel in enterprise/education. I expect it to grow & expand beyond 500 employees.
Score: 23 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Jeaz Avatar
Jeaz
57 months ago
It's strange it's taken them this long to do something like this. The iCloud/iWork suite has a lot of benefits for a small business but there's been very little support from Apple on this. With iCloud Mail, iWork and FaceTime you have a quite decent productivity suite within the Apple Eco System. Hopefully this brings even more focus to iWork apps for collaboration and other features.

I do find it unclear wether or not this includes e-mail accounts. One would have thought the whole custom domain iCloud+ service was sort of a soft launch for this.
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
TheYayAreaLiving 🎗️ Avatar
TheYayAreaLiving 🎗️
57 months ago
Good for the businesses. It seems like it’s going to be very seamless

All set up in one.

Service revenue 🆙
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
BWhaler Avatar
BWhaler
57 months ago

No more leaks. They’re not saying anything anymore. 😂 I’m also surprised Mark Gurman did not mention or know about this.

We got leaks like this now…


View post on X
I generally think Prosser is a total clown and completely lies about his “leaks", but his post is spot on: Apple’s software is getting comically low quality. I can’t believe their competitors aren’t attacking this vector: sure, fast chips, but totally unreliable software.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
PsykX Avatar
PsykX
57 months ago
It's time for Apple to be serious about businesses. They have a few advantages of course, like less IT costs, easy AI models development, etc. but they need to develop more Pro Tools ASAP.

Thinking of a better iWork suite, a collaborative work environment equivalent to Teams, and equivalent to Power tools from Microsoft (Power BI, Power Automate, Power Query, Power Pivot...). And in a place where Access is dying, they need to push FileMaker more. Microsoft has such an edge on Apple in the business world, it's not even funny.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
S
satchmo
57 months ago

It's strange it's taken them this long to do something like this. The iCloud/iWork suite has a lot of benefits for a small business but there's been very little support from Apple on this. With iCloud Mail, iWork and FaceTime you have a quite decent productivity suite within the Apple Eco System. Hopefully this brings even more focus to iWork apps for collaboration and other features.

I do find it unclear wether or not this includes e-mail accounts. One would have thought the whole custom domain iCloud+ service was sort of a soft launch for this.
This is such a long overdue service, considering small businesses basically drive the economy.

While this can scale up to as many as 500 employees, the majority of small businesses are much smaller. I think the key will be pricing for the small 10-20 person shop.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
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