Mobile Solutions, From Start to Finish

Associations Now reported the findings from a new Gartner study, showing that tablets are now outpacing traditional PCs.  As mobile – in the form of smartphones and tablets – begins to grow further, associations need to adapt to get their message out to their audience.

Gartner headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut

Here are three additional takeaways from the Gartner report:

An ongoing decline: In this calendar year, Gartner predicts that PC-based systems will decline to only 315 million units shipped worldwide and tablets will grow to 197 million. Tablet growth is expected to hit 468 million by 2017. 

Popular operating systems: Android is the most popular operating system and is expected to continue grow significantly by 2017. The study predicts this platform will reach 1.5 billion devices worldwide, while Windows is likely to reach 570 million and iOS only 504 million.

The long-term effects: Tablets and their corresponding operating systems are not the last form of new technology that associations will need to adapt to. Margins will decline, consumers will use the cloud more often, and new models will emerge for different segments of the market, such as prepaid models or more targeted applications.  Gartner researcher Carolina Milanesi commented “The trend towards smartphones and tablets will have much wider implications than hardware displacement.  Software and chipset architecture are also impacted by this shift as consumers embrace apps and personal cloud.”

Is your organization ready to embrace the world of tablets?

The Food and Drug Administration Safety Innovation Act (FDASIA) team was developed last year.  They will be providing information that will contribute to the regulation of mHealth and health IT.  Any findings will feed into a report expected to be published in January 2014.

According to MobiHealthNews, the FDAISA, which convened on April 29th, has the mission of seeking insight on matters including:

     -  Types of risk that may be posed by health IT that impact patient safety, the likelihood that these risks will be realized, and the impact of these considerations on a risk-based approach;

     -  Factors or approaches that could be included in a risk-based regulatory approach for health IT to promote innovation and protect patient safety; and

     -  Approaches to avoid duplicative or overlapping regulatory requirements.

The group is comprised of the major players in the mobile health arena, and many some witnesses from the recent congressional hearings on the topic. They include health investor Esther Dyson, Qualcomm’s Robert Jarrin, West Health’s Joseph Smith and lawyer Bradley Thompson.  Providers from hospitals and large corporations are also represented. 

With such diverse voices in the FDASIA, it will be interesting to see how they will affect mobile health regulation and the role the FDA will play in it.