The Workplace environment has always been a critical part of an organisation’s IT infrastructure. As the “front door” to the wider business, security and integrity must be assured. This is a constant challenge in the face of the security landscape in which we operate, and also people’s desire to be more mobile and flexible in where and how they work. It is the first point of experience for many people – whether they are your people or your customers - to engage with your business, which in a highly competitive market can have significant consequences.
As we look forward to 2025 and beyond, it is also an exciting time in Workplace technology. Over the past 24 months, we have seen the explosion of Generative AI, which is now settling into the market with technologies like ChatGPT and Microsoft Copilot being used. The latest trend in this area will be the transition towards “Agentic AI ” as we look further ahead into the market. There have also been innovations in hardware technology, with the emergence of the AI PC category, and just recently in January, Nvidia launching their own PC product in the form of Project Digits.
There are other central trends that continue to be relevant in Workplace – the focus on experience and personalisation – with an increasing trend towards Experience Level Agreements (XLAs), the use of analytics to drive proactive insight and performance, and a retained focus on sustainability. There is a continued focus and drive to deliver better collaboration – better being more inclusive, more equitable – and technology that just works, which is still an issue in far too many offices or working environments than should be the case in 2025.
And all of this is set into a context of 2025, which is the “Year of Windows 10 eradication” – with end of support to the product in October 2025, and an estimated 450 million devices still running Windows 10, of which 270 million are incapable of running Windows 11 – making it a busy year in the Workplace market.
In the midst of all of this, we see the Workplace market at a significant inflection point, caused by changing expectations of people, technology transformations, and the wider macro-economic and business environment. At times like this, it is important to take a step back and reflect on the direction of travel, which is what has led us to define our new vision for the future of Workplace:
Our vision of the future work embraces the three core domains of work:
- The HQ user – enabling them to be productive, collaborative, and inspired wherever and however they choose to work.
- The Frontline user – who have typically not been supported with technology and often feel a sense of detachment from their business. This huge community of users (80% of global workforce) are key to address to activate a transformation in customer engagement.
- The Intelligent Edge – as people and technology increasingly converge, establishing a new order for our relationship between people and machines, our attitudes towards the interconnected world, from where and how technology is used to support the digital world, is a key topic to continually explore.
This vision then manifests into our four central ambitions. When we consider any person operating in any of the domains of work above, we retain our philosophy that workplaces should be Designed for People, Engineered for Business – and our ambitions are our north star for achieving those goals.
Our portfolio and capabilities address our vision already, and our continued investments to our Workplace Portfolio – such as our Device Lifecycle Management (DLM) solution, Endpoint Transformation, or our AI Adoption Services - continue to help our customers drive towards their own future of work.
As we progress through 2025, we have a plan to bring our vision to life through our four ambitions. But this year is a time of action on multiple fronts: to move away from legacy technology, to capitalise on technology innovations, and to equip people to do their best work to service your business and your customers.