Surveying the Mobility Landscape

Put simply, organizations have started to apply mobile
technology to those processes where the integration of real-time information can
drastically improve process quality.

Although mobile email has made some inroads in these areas, the
mobile enablement of enterprise applications represents a quantum shift in
capabilities. The CRM packages have arguably been in the front line of this
trend. One big reason is the strong overlap between the needs of customer-facing
employees and the key strengths of mobile devices, including customer-specific
alerts and the ability to access and update customer records. Thus, so far, the
main emphasis of application mobility has been getting information 'out'
into the hands of field personnel.

Increasingly, however, this emphasis is shifting toward more 'inwardly
directed' (ie less customer-centric) applications such as ERP and SCM, in
which the rapid incorporation of information from the field enables the
optimization of processes such as production planning, inventory management, and
logistics. In both cases, the extension of enterprise applications via mobile
devices has tightened processes, increased responsiveness, and improved decision
making. Examples of mobile applications in specific industries are outlined
below.

Government

Within the government sector, mobile applications are being used to support
public safety, law enforcement and municipal compliance activities. To improve
its responsiveness to disasters, a state emergency response agency employs
mobile devices to update damage assessment databases remotely, thus enabling key
decision makers to assess the situation on the ground and optimize clean-up and
recovery efforts. A state police in India is providing agents on the field with
mobile devices to access a central repository of data on suspects, cases and
other information to increase their effectiveness in arresting and prosecuting
criminals.

Faced with a construction boom, a municipality is seeking to
improve the productivity of building inspectors by providing them with wireless
access to the inspection system and a mobile printing solution to help them work
more effectively at job sites, and provide quicker updates to build the
database.

Financial Services

In the financial services sector, responsiveness to both the existing
customer needs and new opportunities is a critical competitive requirement. To
this end, retail financial service providers are employing mobile devices to
give representatives on the field access to real-time data on their clients'
portfolios during customer meetings. This access gives representatives the tools
to respond to queries instantly and helps customers see opportunities faster.
Financial services providers are also using mobile devices to interact with
their institutional customers.

Manufacturing

For manufacturers, a key to improved efficiency is the tight integration of
SCM and ERP, such that changes to the status of inbound material shipments (via
SCM) can be closely linked to production and delivery commitments they make to
the customers (via ERP). This integration improves manufacturers' overall
responsiveness by enabling them to rapidly adjust their production planning
based on changes in their inbound supply chain. From a mobility standpoint, the
major opportunity is to use mobile devices to speed the capture of this inbound
supply chain data, thereby shortening the feedback loop between the supply chain
and production planning.

Similarly, mobile devices represent a powerful tracking tool for
on-hand inventories of supplies. By giving production planners a more granular
and timely window into the existing supply inventories on the factory floor,
they gain more flexibility to optimize production schedules and lower inventory
costs. Within the manufacturing process itself, the emerging opportunity is to
use these devices to monitor production-line activity and perform real-time
quality control reporting.

Healthcare

Healthcare providers have used mobile devices to improve both quality
control and efficiency in clinical care environments. One area of focus has been
in streamlining the prescription management process, which often experiences
delays because of illegible handwriting and undetected drug interaction issues.
Time-consuming telephone calls are often required to resolve these problems.
Recently, a large HMO began using mobile devices for 'e-prescribing' that
is; doctors can issue prescriptions wirelessly as well as access electronic
physician drug reference and patient-specific drug information. Another
healthcare organization is using mobile devices to improve the efficiency of its
nursing staff, which had previously been required to fill out patient monitoring
forms by hand.

Transportation and Logistics

In the transportation and logistics sector, the optimization of scheduling,
dispatching and route planning is a key driver of operational efficiency. And,
to compete, providers need to minimize their costs and at the same time be
flexible enough to respond quickly to customers' transportation needs. To
achieve this goal, one provider of ground transportation and limousine services
is using mobile devices to give its drivers access to real-time dispatch data
from its back-end systems. In the logistics business, a key differentiator is
the ability to keep customers notified about the status of their shipments in
real time. One provider is using mobile devices to track and manage on-time
performance of deliveries in process, and improve routing efficiencies for its
premium customers. A key enabler is the ability to scan barcodes via mobile
devices, providing more information transparency to all phases of the delivery
cycle.

Legal

One of the biggest initial drivers of mobile device usage in the legal
community, like other sectors, was its ability to support wireless email; a
reflection of just how important it is for law firms to stay in constant touch
with their clients. Simply put, being in court is no excuse. Law firms have
begun to employ mobile devices to provide ubiquitous access to information such
as case files and motions from within their internal case management systems.
Given the importance of staff productivity for law firms, a significant RoI for
mobile device usage has been the increase in billable hours enabled by its
support for remote data access.

Construction

Considering the construction industry relies heavily on subcontracting in
its business model, project management is one of its most important business
processes. To optimize this, commercial construction companies are using mobile
devices to enable project managers to update project data at the work site, thus
keeping clients up to date on project details. Real-time access to project data
also enables project managers to solve problems onsite, thus reducing costly
delays. Moreover, given the rigors of large-scale construction sites, the
ability to employ a more compact device instead of a laptop provides the project
manager with more flexibility.

Mobile application access has also been important in the
residential construction market, where mass production makes quality control and
assurance critical functions. To improve this, a midsize homebuilder is
outfitting its field supervisors with mobile devices to directly access its
quality control reporting system.

The fact that supervisors can directly input the data, shall
improve their efficiency and lower the company's administrative costs. But
more important, it would result in a substantial improvement in quality because
the data on the contractor performance is made readily available for review by
headquarters staff.

On-site Managed Services

For providers of onsite managed services, such as printer or IT support and
maintenance, some key challenges are to respond promptly to customer needs (eg
outages) and to do so in an efficient and cost-effective manner. A key
competency required to meet this challenge is fast and effective reporting from
onsite field technicians. A company that sought to improve its reporting
capability, employed mobile devices to provide technicians with access to its
CRM system-used to store, track, and analyze customer metrics. By creating a
wireless infrastructure for gathering and disseminating customer data to and
from remote sites, the company made customer information available timely and
useful. Through its analytical capabilities, the company was able to proactively
determine areas that needed improvement. On-hand parts inventory levels were
lowered by 15% and emergency parts orders were reduced by 90%. Both reductions
came about as a result of improved data gathering at the customer site. At the
same time, the ability to access CRM data in the field improved the overall
efficiency of field service personnel, resulting in a 10% increase in first-time
problem resolution.

Ravi Subramanyam, director,
mobileOne Infocom

maildqindia@cybermedia.co.in