June 9, 2017

Control enterprise device firmware updates with Enterprise FOTA

Samsung Knox News

Many enterprises invest significant resources into custom apps to support their business processes. These apps can allow employees to fulfill their duties regardless of their location—whether in an office or on the road.

When your employees rely upon your apps to be productive, the last thing that you want is for those apps to break. If an employee updates their mobile device to a new firmware version, it's possible that your apps might be incompatible with the new firmware.

Previously, you could use an EMM policy to prohibit users from upgrading their firmware OTA, or disallow all firmware updates. While these methods are effective in preventing unwanted upgrades, they don't offer the flexibility that allow organizations to test new firmware versions and selectively roll them out to their users.

Enterprise FOTA (Firmware Over-The-Air) enables enterprises to control which versions of firmware updates are installed on their employees' devices. This allows you to verify that business critical software is compatible with a specific firmware version before you distribute the firmware to employee devices. This can prevent unwanted incompatibilities between corporate software and firmware.

 

Controlling firmware versions on employee devices

The process of using Knox E-FOTA to control firmware versions on devices can be broken down into three phases, which correspond with the available APIs:

1. Register a group with the Knox Enterprise FOTA service

2. Get a list of available firmware versions from the B2B server

3. Update devices to a specified firmware version by either:

  • Configure and schedule forced updates for a group of devices. This doesn’t require any end-user interaction to accept an update, unlike regular FOTA.
  • Set which version of firmware the devices can be updated to using FOTA. Users can't update the device to a higher firmware version. This still requires end-user confirmation to accept an update, but the target version can be controlled.

You can manage your enterprise devices by creating several groups of devices.  You can prevent software conflicts by choosing one of the groups to be used for testing devices (say as part of a Software Quality Assurance team). You roll out the desired firmware version to those devices and then test your corporate apps on those devices. Once any issues have been addressed, you can then roll out firmware updates to other groups of devices, and update any corporate apps that were changed to work with the new firmware.

 

Next steps

 

[Icon] close

Get the right solution for your business

Join 25,000+ organizations around the world.

[Icon] suitcase
Are you a reseller or solution partner?

Get access to the Knox Partner Program for helpful partner tools, such as the Knox Deployment Program portal, Knox MSP portal, partner SDKs, and more.

[Icon] info
Unified Endpoint Management
Knox Suite
Rebranding and customization
Knox Configure
Fraud and theft protection
Knox Guard
Device protection plan
Samsung Care + for Business
Other products & services

Get started with

[Image] Knox Suite

All-in-one solution bundle for enterprise mobility.

[Icon] Check mark

Join us and get a 90-day free trial for Knox Suite and other Knox products. *Approval required

[Icon] Check mark

A complete set of tools to secure, deploy, manage, and analyze your enterprise's corporate mobile devices.

[Icon] Check mark

Try powerful features bundled with Knox Suite, such as Knox Remote Support.

Knox Suite include:

[Icon] Knox Platform for Enterprise Knox Platform for Enterprise
[Icon] Knox E-FOTA Knox E-FOTA
[Icon] Knox Mobile Enrollment Knox Mobile Enrollment
[Icon] Knox Asset Intelligence Knox Asset Intelligence
[Icon] knox manage Knox Manage
[Icon] knox capture Knox Capture

Get started with

[Image] Knox Configure Logo

Remotely configure Samsung devices in bulk and tailor them to specific needs, right out of the box.

[Icon] Check mark

After approval, you can try both the:

  • Setup edition — designed for a one-time deployment
  • Dynamic edition — deploy and update policies as many times without a factory reset.
[Icon] Check mark

Try either the Setup edition or Dynamic edition of Knox Configure on up to 30 devices.

[Icon] Check mark

Get a free Knox Suite trial upon approval to try our UEM.

Get started with

[Icon] Knox Guard Logo

Remotely control Samsung devices to reduce financial risks and protect assets.

[Icon] Check mark

After you get approved, generate your free trial license for 90 days.

check-mark

Try all the features of Knox Guard on up to 30 devices, including SIM control and device locking.

[Icon] Check mark

Get a free Knox Suite trial upon approval to try our UEM.

Get started with

[Image] Samsung Care Plus For Business Logo

Protect your business devices against accidental damage and mechanical breakdowns.

[Icon] Check mark

Are you already a Samsung Care+ for Business customer? Create an account and access the Samsung Care+ for Business console.

[Icon] Check mark

Contact the Samsung sales team and get peace of mind for your devices.

Other products & services

[Image] Others logo
[Icon] Check mark

Samsung offers additional solutions to serve the unique needs of your business. Talk to a Samsung expert today.

CONTACT SALES
Back to top