Apple pulling the plug on Fleetsmith device management service in October

Existing users of Apple's Fleetsmith device management service have been notified that it will be discontinued on October 21, and no new users can now be added.

In principle, Fleetsmith is similar to both Jamf and the new Apple Business Essentials, in that it aimed to help large companies manage the Apple devices they distribute to their staff. Originally a third-party service, it was bought by Apple in 2020.

The service then immediately lost its previous support for third-party apps. Administrators using the service could then not deploy, for instance, Zoom, to their Apple devices.

Now in a new support document, Apple has announced that the service is closing entirely. As of April 21, 2022, no new users can be added.

Then from October 21, 2022, existing users will no longer be able to log in or use the service. Apple's support documentation recommends migrating to a different mobile device management (MDM) solution.

The move presumably comes as the similar Apple Business Essentials service has gone live in the US. However, Apple's support documentation neither promotes that new service, nor even mentions it.

3 Comments

rob53 14 Years · 3320 comments

About 2 years ago

I went to the Support app on my iPhone, typed in Apple Business Essentials and it listed some websites about it. It’s also been on Apple’s home page. I call this mentioning it. I looked through it a couple weeks ago but it appears to require a business license number to even demo it.

InspiredCode 9 Years · 405 comments

rob53 said:

I went to the Support app on my iPhone, typed in Apple Business Essentials and it listed some websites about it. It’s also been on Apple’s home page. I call this mentioning it. I looked through it a couple weeks ago but it appears to require a business license number to even demo it.

It is pretty limited at this time, but Apple has promised to fill in some of the missing features this summer. Apple has been paving the way for new MDM features with Business Essentials, so it is pretty likely many of the missing features are in the process of getting redesigned for a new version of the MDM specification and will require a new operating system version.

It is a hard choice right now. Do you stick with business essentials which is still half baked but may be the future or go with a tried and true solution.