When the world shut down, mobile devices powered on – and the workplace has never been the same. Less than one-third of companies have returned to a fully in-person model, and the average employeenow uses 2-3 mobile devices. So much has changed, and that has changed a lot in terms of mobile procurement.
Roughly 75% of IT leaders struggle with sourcing new mobile assets in today’s modern world, from shipping complexities and device tracking to governance and cost control. Growing dependence on hybrid work and mobility has turned procurement from a back-office task into a strategic business function that directly impacts agility, security, employee experience, and financial performance.
In this article, we look at the top challenges of device acquisition in a hybrid world and key strategies for modernizing procurement – helping reduce complexity, optimize spend, and keep employees reliably connected no matter where they are.
The Reality of Legacy Procurement in a Modern World
The expectation: keep costs down
Find new ways to save, optimize spend, and lock in the best prices
The reality: cost control requires more operational horsepower than most teams have
Procurement efficiency is one of the most powerful levers for savings – forecasting demand accurately, aligning purchases with actual need, and negotiating from a position of strength – but that level of control requires more time and insight than most teams have. Managed Mobility Services (MMS) makes all the difference.
The heavy lifting happens behind the scenes:
- The MMS partner maintains seed stock inventory (both new and recycled devices) so teams never overbuy and underuse.
- Leading partners have multiple depots across the world, meaning faster delivery and lower shipping costs.
- They’ll also manage all vendor and carrier relationships. Here at Tangoe, we use pricing intelligence and benchmarking to drive negotiating power most teams can’t achieve on their own.
The expectation: keep inventory lean
Ensure devices are accessible
The reality: scattered data, clouded visibility, and buffered inventory
Procurement shouldn’t have to guess whether a device is available or keep excess inventory on hand just to ensure coverage. Inventory needs to be lean, and devices need to be available – and it all gets significantly harder in a hybrid model. Again, we see the power of MMS. Tangoe has teams that work out of each of our global logistics warehouses dedicated solely to handling all the equipment in our customers’ stock and keeping their inventory data up to date.
The expectation: keep devices in hand
Streamline procurement processes to avoid unnecessary delays and ensure employees have what they need, when they need it
The reality: friction slows everything down
It’s easy to get devices in hand when everyone’s under one roof. In a hybrid model, a request can easily stretch into days without standardized, automated procurement processes. Every delay in device access ripples outward.
The expectation: keep devices secure and compliant
Ensure devices are sourced in line with security and compliance policies
The reality: governance gets harder as employees spread out
Hybrid creates extra security and compliance considerations and challenges, from permissions and workflow coordination to an expanded pool of carriers and resellers. In one 2024 study, nearly 60% of companies admitted to frequently bending on compliance due to a number of pressures and challenges.
Modernizing Device Procurement: 6 Must-haves for Hybrid Work
Need #1: Centralized Data Access
Data centralization is critical no matter where employees work, but especially if your workforce is distributed. Procurement needs a unified view of vendor agreements and pricing tiers, contract terms and renewal timelines, device inventory and asset ownership, carrier plans and usage data, and real-time spend across regions and departments.
This single pane-of-glass view lays the groundwork to start strategizing: comparing vendors side-by-side, flagging excess inventory, seeing how spend behaves, and aligning sourcing decisions with workforce trends.
Need #2: Workflow Automation
Workflow automation removes friction from routine processes, allowing procurement to focus on strategy instead of chasing orders, tracking shipments, and reconciling data across systems.
Modern procurement workflows should automate:
- Approval routing based on role, region, and spend thresholds
- Which devices and plans are available to specific user groups based on business rules
- Order submission across approved vendors and carriers (Tangoe’s automated ordering platform saves 45 minutes per order and has 99.7% ordering accuracy)
- Status updates and notifications throughout fulfillment
- Exception handling without derailing standard processes
Automation is crucial for reducing delays, minimizing errors from duplicate data entry, adherence to business policies, and ensuring consistency across regions.
Need #3: AI-powered Analytics
Just like everything else in the world, modern procurement requires the power of AI to crunch down mountains of information and surface insights that can be quickly acted on. This can include identifyingpurchasing patterns and anomalies, flagging excess inventory and aging assets, highlighting underperforming vendors, and forecasting demand based on workforce trends.
Need #4: Flexible Shipping Locations
If an employee is traveling next week, their device should ship to where they’ll be – not where they were last week. That level of flexibility is no longer optional, but table stakes.
Modern procurement means having a default shipping address per employee, with the ability to easily customize or override it when needed. Devices can be delivered virtually anywhere – home, office, client site – or fulfilled through the closest global logistics facility when employees are working abroad. One-time address changes should be simple, whether that means shipping a replacement phone to a hotel or sending a laptop to a conference location. In a hybrid world, procurement must meet employees where they are across cities, countries, and time zones.
Need #5: Role-based Ordering Permissions
Not every organization handles procurement the same way. Some allow employees to order directly from an approved catalog. Others require managers or admins to place orders on behalf of workers. Some users may need temporary elevated access.
Modern procurement must support:
- Admin-controlled approval workflows
- Temporary permissions that can be granted and revoked
- Role-based access to specific device tiers
- Governance around high-cost or specialized equipment
Flexibility without guardrails creates risk. Guardrails without flexibility create bottlenecks. Modern procurement needs both. See how Tangoe streamlines catalog management to save 2 days per month per vendor.
Need #6: A Dynamic Mobile Store
Employees expect consumer-grade experiences at work. Procurement needs enterprise-grade control behind the scenes. An online mobile store brings both together, giving employees a simple way to request approved devices while procurement maintains full governance over what can be ordered.
A modern mobile store helps procurement:
- Standardize device models and configurations
- Enforce purchasing policies automatically
- Guide users toward approved options
- Reduce shadow buying and reimbursement requests
- Improve onboarding and replacement timelines
- Avoid the rigmarole with a seamless, intuitive, “Amazon-level” user experience
Employees can immediately tell the difference in terms of ease and efficiency. For procurement, it embeds policy directly into the ordering process – eliminating manual intervention while preserving control. Check out Tangoe’s Online Mobile Store.
Other things you shouldn’t forget:
- System integration: whatever mobility management platform your organization uses, it should offer extensive integration support with hardware vendors, service providers, IT, HR systems, and more to automate tasks like device returns, disconnections, and carrier changes. This integration is also critical for unlocking data-driven insights. Not only does Tangoe offer one of the most extensive ecosystems of mobility system integrations, but we can tailor an integrated solution to fit a client’s exact business needs.
- Automated notifications: automatic alerts help move device requests from start to finish without people needing to chase down information. Employees are automatically notified when their device ships,procurement is alerted if an order stalls, and anyone else involved in the process stays coordinated – wherever they happen to be working from.
- 24/7 help desk: this is crucial for getting the global support employees need for order issues, anytime
. Our MMS platform, Tangoe One Mobile, offers 24×7/365, omnichannel (phone, email, chat, self-service) support for any device located anywhere with help in 11 different languages. Learn more about our Help Desk.
Modern Device Procurement Starts Here
Modern procurement requires visibility across vendors, contracts, assets, and spend. It demands automation to keep requests moving, AI to surface actionable insights, flexible fulfillment to meet employees wherever they are, and governance models that balance speed with control. Most importantly, it requires a connected platform approach that brings data, workflows, analytics, and support together into a single operational experience.
Tangoe fires on all cylinders. Our MMS platform is purpose-built to modernize mobile procurement with AI intelligence and automation at the core. Everything you’ve read about here comes right out of the boxso procurement can move faster, smarter, and with confidence – wherever work happens.
See why Tangoe One Mobile was named the 2025 Mobile Device Management platform of the year.