Technology played a critical role in 2020 as businesses in all industries across the globe adapted to the challenges of a global pandemic.
The newly released report, Businesses at Work 2021, based on Okta’s network of 9,400 customers and more than 6,500 integrations with cloud, mobile and web apps, and IT infrastructure providers – gives an understanding of the apps that powered work in 2020.
The year’s top apps include a combination of best-of-breed solutions and remote work winners.
Results include:
- For the first time ever, 90 per cent of the fastest-growing apps are new to the top 10, reflecting the rapid shift to remote work that drove companies to adopt innovative ways to keep their workforces connected, secure, and productive.
- Amazon Business, which offers organisations a platform for buying office or WFH essentials, is the year’s fastest-growing app, seeing 341 per cent growth.
- Hot collaboration tools like Miro, Figma and comalso saw a surge in customers throughout the year as organisations pivoted to remote work and looked for solutions to remain productive.
- Employee engagement tool Lattice claimed a spot in the top 10 — the first HR tool to do so since 2016.
- AWS is the fastest growing app in APAC, where it has seen over 25 per cent growth since April 2020, compared to 16 per cent growth in North America during the same time period.
The most popular apps:
- Microsoft365 continues to hold the top spot, but Zoom, AWS, DocuSign, and other tools powering remote work made large gains.
- Next-gen security tools Fortinet FortiGate and Palo Alto Networks GlobalProtect joined the list.
- APAC customers’ deployment puts ServiceNow, Mimecast, Xero, and Palo Alto Networks GlobalProtect into APAC’s top 15 most popular apps.
The results showed that during 2020, organisations across APAC turned to new apps to help them carry on through massive disruption, cementing technology’s critical role in success across every industry. The report also indicated a shift towards better security practices as businesses grappled with an unparalleled number of cyber threats and the increased risks that come with operating a remote workforce.”
Best-of-breed solutions also beat platforms, while network effects amplify the staying power of platforms like Salesforce, Google Workspace, and Microsoft 365, best-of-breed solutions are nipping at their heels.
Of those respondents who were Microsoft 365 customers, almost 10 per cent deploy six or more best-of-breed apps, highlighting the increasing importance of flexibility and functionality as employees work remotely.
About 42 per cent deploy Zoom, this year’s fifth most popular app by number of customers. Another 32 per cent use Slack, the seventh most popular app. Okta’s Microsoft 365 customers also double bundle with over 36 per cent deploying Google Workspace (formerly G Suite) as well.
Organisations get smart about security
To secure distributed workforces, organisations invested heavily in people-centric solutions. After three years as a fastest-growing app, security awareness training tool KnowBe4 is now the number 14 most popular app by number of customers. Companies are getting smarter about security, too.
Rather than using simple and traditionally weak two-factor methods, businesses are increasingly turning to adaptive forms of authentication like Okta Verify to secure their workforces. SMS as a security factor dropped from 53 per cent two years ago to 49 per cent today, and security questions similarly dropped 18 per cent two years ago to 15 per cent today.
This suggests businesses are taking employee security risks more seriously.
Developers double down on digital experiences: This year, more interactions between end users and brands took place online than ever before.
As a result, organisations have increased their focus on building engaging, user-friendly digital experiences. Atlassian Product Suite, which includes a number of developers tools, maintains its spot as the most popular developer app. GitHub and PagerDuty sit in second and third place, respectively.
