Apple’s Volume Purchase Program comes with a host of advantages for companies and workers. Here’s how VPP empowers IT Admins and simplifies their work.
The Apple Volume Purchase Program (VPP) allows businesses and educational institutions to purchase apps and books in volume, with additional tools to distribute and manage purchases in bulk for iPhones, iPads, or Mac devices. Apple VPP was specifically created to simplify purchasing and distribution, helping consolidate purchasing to just one account versus many different user accounts. The program is free to set up and easy to manage.
While Apple makes software purchasing and distribution easy through VPP and its Apple Device Enrollment Programs (DEP), your device environment is not likely Apple-only. Managing multiple device types means you could end up managing multiple software purchasing, distribution, and endpoint management platforms. As easy as each one of them may be, this creates more complexity than is necessary.
Using UEM to Manage Apple VPP
The future of endpoint management is becoming less about devices and apps and more about managing relationships – between user and device, company and app, employee and company, and devices and the vendor. To simplify complex device landscapes, unified endpoint management (UEM) platforms help manage multiple device platforms from within a single solution, including the management of Apple VPP and DEP.
Leveraging your UEM platform for VPP, you can distribute apps directly to managed devices or authorized users in any country where the app is available, keeping track of what has been assigned to each user or device. With managed distribution, you have complete control over the entire process, retaining full ownership of apps, even if they are distributed to BYOD devices enrolled in your MDM / UEM platform. When a user no longer needs an app or they leave the organization, you can revoke or reassign apps to different users in your organization.
Automating Deployment
Managed distribution via UEM helps organizations target software distribution based on criteria the admin determines, including, for example, departments, user roles, devices types, and self-service or mandatory installation. Once an imaged device is assigned to a user, automation can take over, installing applications where they are needed. With UEM to manage Apple’s zero-touch deployment, the unboxing and installation of these customized configurations can be made seamless – for IT and for the users.
Of course, you can leverage your UEM to provide additional insight into your deployment, including tracking when Apple VPP licenses run low, detecting unused licenses, self-healing critical apps to retain productivity and security, and providing enterprise geo-tracking control.
With over 25 years of Apple experience, FileWave offers a well-established, native solution for managing macOS and iOS devices. Unlike traditional Windows management tools that in recent years have added token Mac management capabilities, our rich history and commitment to supporting Apple technologies means our products are designed from the start to fully leverage the newest management frameworks, leveraging tools such as DEP, VPP, MDM, and more. This native Apple management approach continues to be a driving factor in our development – ensuring complete support for Apple’s unique systems.
Contact us to find out whether FileWave is a fit for your team. Request your 30-day free trial now.
