Microsoft finally released the long-awaited Intune Suite, or as it is called in Intune “add-ons”.
But what is the Intune Suite and why should I even care? That’s what I’m set out to cover in this blog post, and we will take a look at what there is right now and what’s to come.
One major change happened when this was introduced, and that is how Intune is licensed. Or at least it got some new names. Microsoft Intune Plan 1 is what previously was just called Intune and is included in the Microsoft 365 and EMS plans. This will give you the core Intune features as you have been using them today (with some exceptions).
Then we have Microsoft Intune Plan 2 which are some add-ons to plan 1 including Microsoft Intune Tunnel for Mobile Application Management, which will give you an option to use Intune Tunnel together with your MAM enabled applications. And then we also have Microsoft Intune management of specialty devices, which enables you to manage specialty devices in Intune such as AR/VR devices, conference room meeting devices and large smart screen devices.
For Plan 1, there is also a possibility to buy Remote Help, Endpoint Privilege Management, Advanced Endpoint Analtics and the other upcoming features as standalone services to your Plan 1.
Intune Suite – premium features for Intune
The Intune Suite is a packaged deal which includes all the bells and whistles. You get Plan 1 and Plan 2, but also all the nice extra add-ons. Today, this list is quite limited since it will only get you Plan 2, MS Intune Tunnel for MAM and Remote Help on-top of your Plan 1 licens (which you got from your M365 license anyway). BUT, and this is the selling point, you will get all the upcoming features once they are released.
The two already released premium features (if we disregard the Plan 2 features), are by them self really good products. I’ve previously covered the Remote Help app which since then has been refined even further.
Microsoft has further announced that they will release Endpoint Privilege Management (which is currently in public preview) and Advanced Endpoint Analytics as a start, but there are more things coming which will make this suite even better!
Why should I consider this?
Should you consider the Microsoft Intune suite? Well, that depends on your needs. For some, it certanly makes sense to consider it given that they are interested in a lot of the listed features. For others, maybe just one is interesting which then makes more sense to buy as add-ons on it’s on rather than buying the whole suite.
I think, as of right now, Remote Help and the upcoming Endpoint Privilege Management is what will be most useful for many companies as it solves two major headaches: A remote support tool integrated to Intune and a first party solution to manage local administrator. There are a lot of other good tools out there to manage both remote support and local administrator but having a first party tool comes with advantages such as good integrations to Intune for e.g. reporting.
I will in feature post dig in more to the features of the Intune Suite, but for now we have set the scene!
