iPads drive productivity at Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr

Law firm Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr has embraced tablet computing to greatly increase its productivity. The firm allows staff to use their own Apple iPads, securely providing remote access to its core applications, including office applications, document management and storage, and video conferencing.

The firm, one of the largest commercial law firms in the country, employs over 250 legal practitioners, split between offices in Johannesburg and Cape Town. Matteo Pagani, enterprise systems administrator for Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr, says the firm's legal minds have been quick to benefit from the productivity offered by the mobility and convenience of tablet computing. Over 75 iPads have been deployed so far, Pagani says, with demand constantly on the rise.

“It's not device envy,” Pagani says. “It's productivity envy. You can't ignore how much more work a colleague manages to accomplish with an iPad.”

The firm has standardised on Apple iPads, and is using Citrix application virtualisation technologies to extend corporate applications to mobile users, who connect to the firm's network over 3G. The Citrix Receiver app on each user's iPad gives them access to exactly the same Microsoft Office tools they use on desktop PCs, with the applications centrally deployed and managed on the firm's central servers.

“Although tablet apps provide basic document viewing and editing, we needed to include additional features,” Pagani says, such as the ability to track changes and internal house styles, and integration with other services.

Of particular importance to Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr was access to the firm's document management repository. The company has over 3.5 million documents managed by the Interwoven content solution, with every piece of data instantly retrievable via searches conducted from within Office, and new or updated documents automatically managed by the repository as well.

To maintain productivity and security, that same degree of integration had to be extended to mobile users, and extending the full applications to tablets through Citrix Receiver was the only way, Pagani says.

Users logging into the firm's Citrix environment see a simple menu of available applications, such as Microsoft Outlook, Word, third-party applications or a full Windows desktop if necessary, with no compromises in features or user experience.

“We use the standard mechanisms - remote wipe, password protection, and so on, but the risk is negligible,” Pagani says. “All our data is stored and protected centrally. And a user who stops working on a document on his PC in the office, then opens it on his iPad at home, will find the document exactly how he left it.”

The strict security around the virtualised applications and central data also means the company can offer more flexibility around tablet apps than it can with desktops, Pagani notes. “We still have to lock down desktops. There is so much malware out there. But we can give people flexibility in their choice of tablet apps - if they want to download an app from the app store and try it out, they can. It won't have any access to their work files and applications.”

Pagani set up an iPad user group within the law firm, where users can keep up to date with apps and iOS software updates/features.

In addition to desktop applications, Pagani has also extended the reach of Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr's video conferencing facilities to iPad users. With practitioners split between Johannesburg and Cape Town, the firm's Polycom video conferencing facilities are in constant use. The Polycom iPad app means mobile users can be included in conferences wherever they are.

The rapid shift to mobile is also extending to other legal resources, Pagani notes. Legal services such as LexisNexis Butterworths and Juta Law are moving to either publish tablet apps of their own, or tune their Web services to be tablet-friendly.

Matteo Pagani will be speaking at the “iPad in Enterprise” event, sponsored by Core Group. Pagani will discuss Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr's iPad project, how his users are benefiting from tablet computing, and how the firm manages the devices, applications and data.

Other experts will discuss the trends driving BYOD usage and how this is empowering users in new ways, delving into the infrastructure, management and security requirements of these devices in an enterprise network, and exploring the ways in which enterprise applications can be extended and integrated to iPad users.

For more information about the event, which takes place on 31 July, in Johannesburg, and on 2 August, in Cape Town, click here.