As previously announced Apple held its traditional September event-- one featuring the announcement of the much awaited iPad Pro, a larger version of the popular tablet with an obvious focus on enterprise customers.

In fact, the device was revealed only after talk on enterprise partnerships with IBM and Cisco. As repeatedly suggested by rumours, the iPad Pro is the biggest (12.9-inch) and most powerful Apple tablet yet.  It is powered by a specially designed 64-bit A9X chip promising double the graphics, memory bandwidth and disk performance of the A8X, as well as 10 hours battery life, for "desktop-class performance." Audio comes through a 4-speaker array.

Apple forms a partnership with Cisco in the creation of a "fast lane for iOS business users"-- essentially the optimising of Cisco networks for iDevices and apps.

The partnership involves the integration of iPhones within Cisco enterprise voice and video environments, as well as "unique" collaboration via iOS-optimised versions of Cisco mobile, cloud and premises-based tools such as Spark, Telepresence and WebEx.

According to the Wall Street Journal Apple is working with over 40 companies in an effort to turn the iPad into a more appealing enterprise tool as part of the Mobility Partner Program (MPP).

One part of effort involves smaller companies (named examples include accounting firm Xero, digital cash register company Revel Systems, and field-service software firm ServiceMax) training Apple business specialists. Other unnamed companies have even been invited to Apple sales conferences normally closed to non-Apple staff.

In addition the WSJ says Apple is pushing developers into creating a more cohesive ecosystem of interoperable iPad business apps based on feedback from the aforementioned partner companies.

Intel announces the Xeon server processor lineup will find use in somewhat smaller hardware-- notebooks, as the Xeon E3-1500M v5 family promises "workstation-class capabilities in a portable device."

Based on Skylake architecture, Xeon E3-1500M v5 features "key features" such as error-correcting code memory for enchanted reliability and Intel vPro hardware-assisted security, manageability and productivity. Connectivity comes through Thunderbolt 3, or as Intel puts it "the USB-C that does it all."