Sophos announced the hosted version of its mobile device management (MDM) solution, Sophos Mobile Control, which allows businesses to deploy an MDM solution without any changes to their existing IT infrastructures, alleviating any further management burden on IT.

Companies using Sophos Mobile Control as a Service can complete countless tasks - from creating policies to uploading lists of users and developing Acceptable Use Policies for employee-owned devices through the web-based admin console. The service requires nothing more than a browser on the customer premises.

Designed with usability in mind, and based on user feedback, the structure of the Sophos Mobile Control web console, self-service portal and the mobile client provide customers with a powerful and intuitive solution that is easy to use and offers the benefit of no hardware on the customer site, resulting in savings to both capital and operating expenditures, as no maintenance is required.

"The expansion of BYOD programmes and the prevalence of mobile devices on business networks means mobile device management is an issue with which companies of all sizes are grappling. This presents a great opportunity for resellers and other solution providers, as many companies are looking to their IT consultants for help managing mobile devices," said Stacy Crook, senior analyst, Mobile Enterprise Research, IDC.

"The launch of Sophos Mobile Control as our first hosted service represents a significant milestone in our product strategy," said Matthias Pankert, vice president, product management, Sophos. "Security applications are rapidly moving toward the cloud to provide flexibility and scalability, which today's businesses demand. With limited resources and a multitude of security solutions to manage, mobile devices in particular are often left uncontrolled. Our SaaS-based solution ensures that these devices are controlled and managed, even for small groups of users within a company."

Sophos Mobile Control is available for on-premise installation or as Software as a Service under a subscription license. The on-premise version is also included in the Sophos Complete Security Suite, which combines endpoint, data, email, web, server and mobile protection in one license. Sophos offers additional mobile security solutions such as Sophos Mobile Security, an antivirus app for Android devices available for free download on Google Play and Sophos Mobile Encryption, an app used in conjunction with SafeGuard Enterprise Encryption for Cloud Storage to allow mobile access to encrypted files in the cloud.