In this article, we are going to describe powerful mobile marketing methods you can implement in just a few minutes. We will investigate what the industry and the technology allow us to do today, how to persuade people to sign up for your service and which file formats to use when you deliver your content. We will also take a sneak peek on what will happen with mobile marketing in the near future.

The hands-on experience is based on solving marketing problems with the help of InfoNU (www.infonu.com). InfoNU is a free web based mobile mass communication platform that supports the latest trends in mobile marketing. With InfoNU you can:

• Send SMS messages such as personalized alerts and mobile coupons
• Push mobile content like banners, mp3-songs, ringtones, video clips, visiting cards and java games
• Push links to mobile websites
• Create and schedule mobile campaigns
• Sign up and manage consumers
• Get your own icon next to the address book and calendar to publish mobile content without cost
• View statistics on how mobile marketing efforts are received by users

As in all sectors in explosive growth, bright people gravitate towards mobile marketing, create start-up companies, offer solutions and unfortunately also create a big creative mess full of definitions, standards, ideas and solutions. This article series is the authors attempt to untangle the web of technologies into easy-to-use patters you can use in your everyday marketing of your brand, company, products and services.

A second part of this article is planned. In Part 2 we will take a closer look at advanced concepts in mobile marketing like tailor-made mobile applications and mobile community services.

Permission Marketing and What Mobile Marketing is NOT

A mobile phone is a highly personal communication device. Mobile marketing is not about spamming uninterested people with irrelevant SMS messages at 2:00 am. Marketers have to respect this. Never send messages to someone without having their permission. Sending unsolicited SMS messages to people is not good marketing. Aside from the ethical aspect of spam, it does not work and costs you a lot of money. Do not do it.

Marketing activities that depends on the permission of the consumer is referred to as permission marketing and is central to mobile marketing. Embrace permission marketing and protect your list of consumers, it is the people who have given you permission to speak.

The Mobile Marketing Dance

Instead of sending unsolicited SMS messages, the trick in mobile marketing is to persuade people to sign up for your service and then to find a balance between providing sales driving information and offering value so that your customers are both informed and happy.

How to Persuade People to Sign Up for Your Service

What can you offer that makes your consumers accept the commercial side of your company? Here are a few suggestions:

1. Promote the following message by printing it on your packaged goods: Text COCACOLA to +44 77 86 202 988 (normal SMS cost). The first 100 people to text us will win a free subscription on Coca-Cola magazine. After you received 100 replies, call up the winners and get their address.
2. Promote the following message on billboards, posters, banners or signs around your town: Text WHEATIES to +44 77 86 202 988 (normal SMS cost) to get our new ringtone.
3. Promote the following message with an ad in your favorite newspaper: Text ABBA to +44 77 86 202 988 (normal SMS cost) to get our new song.
4. Promote the following message with an ad in your favorite newspaper: Text ROXETTE to +44 77 86 202 988 (normal SMS cost) to get our new video.
5. Promote the following text on your web site: Do you want information about us in your mobile? Click on this link and enter your contact details.
6. Promote the following text in your TV commercials: Text ARMANI to +44 77 86 202 988 (normal SMS cost) and win a trip for two to Paris. The winner will be notified the 16′th of August.
7. Promote the following text in your radio commercials: Text ATARI to +44 77 86 202 988 (normal SMS cost) and get Pac-Man to your phone.
8. Promote the following text in your TV commercials: Text MCDONALDS to +44 77 86 202 988 (normal SMS cost) to claim your 10% discount coupon.

In other words: Send something back as a Thank you for signing up. Give your new user something for free. Give your new user a possibility to win something nice. At least a thank you SMS.

To configure InfoNU so that you automatically send something back when new consumers sign up to your service, log on to your InfoNU account, select Settings in the Intranet Home menu followed by SMS Signup settings, click on Details for your code word and enable Respond automatically with an SMS message. You can send back an SMS message, mobile content like images, video and music, a link to your mobile web site or a Java application.

To integrate your own web site with InfoNU as in the fifth example above, select Help in the Intranet Home menu followed by Integrate InfoNU and click on Generate Link.

File Formats to Use when Distributing Mobile Content

Since virtually all mobile phones support SMS messaging, sending SMS messages is the simplest and most reliable way to come across to mobiles. SMS messages are as we all know limited to 160 characters but can contain links to mobile content.

All mobile phones does not support the same media formats. If you have no a-priori knowledge about your consumers phones but still want to reach the biggest possible audience, use to the following file formats:

Media, File Format,File Extension

Images, Portable network graphics, .png

Sound, MP3 songs, .mp3

Video, 3GPP video 3gp

Ringtones Midi music .mid

This list of file formats comes from analyzing mobile phones produced by the biggest manufacturers and ranking the phones after how common each phone is in practice.

Three other interesting file formats can be used for more specialized tasks:

Media, File Format, File Extension

Visiting cards and address book entries, vCard, .vcf

Calendar entries, vCard, .vcs

Java games, Java application descriptor files, .jad

Distributing links to mobile content with InfoNU is performed in the exact same way regardless of file format: You log on to your InfoNU account, select Uploads and upload the content from your PC to your InfoNU account. To distribute the content to a single person, click that person’s Communicate link. Make sure that Upload is selected as Type of Content.

If you want to send an SMS message to many people, create a campaign by clicking on Campaigns in the Intranet Home menu followed by New campaign. With InfoNU, you can also schedule campaigns to be run at a specific date and time. Go to Campaigns and click on Schedule campaign to define the start date of your campaign.

A Catalogue of Mobile Marketing Patterns

After your user signed up for your service, his/hers mobile phone transforms into an excellent communication channel. This section lists proven marketing methods for you to reuse:

Task: Inform customers about new products and updates, new offers and relevant company news.

Solution: Send an SMS message at an appropriate time with the information.

Note: To know when to send your message, ask yourself the following two questions: When is this information relevant to my mobile user? When will the message have the biggest impact? If you are selling umbrellas, sending your message when your customer is outside your store on his way home and it is raining outside might be a good idea. When is it not a good idea to send a message? At night? In the morning?

InfoNU supports sending personalized SMS messages. By using the tags {FirstName}, {LastName}, and {Mobile} in your SMS text, you can personalize the message with the recipients name and mobile phone number.

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Task: Promote your rock groups new album.

Solution: Promote the following message: Text THECHAINSAWS to +44 77 86 202 988 (normal SMS cost) to get our new song. Follow up by sending an SMS message to everyone who signed up when your new album is released.

Note: Distributing video to mobile phones is possible today but do not expect top quality and do not expect to send out more than 10 seconds. Advances in mobile streaming technologies will make longer video transmissions possible in a few years.

To distribute a song to mobile phones convert it to an .mp3-file, log on to your InfoNU account, select Uploads and upload your song from your PC to your InfoNU account. You can distribute the song either to an individual person or create a campaign to send content to large groups of fans.

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Task: You have a nice jingle that you would like to be recognized in the metro.

Solution: Produce a ringtone and send it to your consumers for free.

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Task: Increase sales by distributing a mobile coupon to your customers.

Solution: Send out the following SMS message to your consumers: Here is your coupon for the movie. Show this message and get two tickets for the price of one. A43-K32-F83.

To create SMS coupons with InfoNU, use the {Coupon} tag in your SMS text. InfoNU will automatically create the coupon text for you. To view coupons and its owners, select Mobile Users and click on Mobile coupons.

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Task: Get new customers by using viral marketing.

Solution: Create an SMS campaign with the following text: Welcome to Marty’s Bar. This is your VIP pass. Show this message and get a free beer. Feel free to send this message to your friends.

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Task: You want to create an SMS newsletter that is delivered once a day.

Solution: Create several days of SMS campaigns with your content. Schedule the campaigns so that one is run every week.

To schedule a campaign to be run at a specific day, log on to your InfoNU account, select Campaigns in the Intranet Home menu and click on Campaign schedule.

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Task: You are having an event together with all your employees and customers.

Solution: Send out an invitation as an SMS message one week before the event. Send an SMS message the day before to remind everybody. Schedule SMS messages to be sent during the event to sychronize people. Send out an event the day after the event to say thank you and to follow up.

But…We have Invested in a WAP Site?

If your company has a mobile web site or a WAP site, use SMS messaging to simplify access to your site. Send an SMS message with a link to your site. To visit your site, your consumer simply opens the SMS message and does not have to enter your URL adress on the mobile phone:

Task: Promote your mobile web site and make it easier to access.

Solution: Add the following text to your web site: Mobile Access At All Times. Get our news on your mobile. Text REUTERS to +44 77 86 202 988 (normal SMS cost). Send back an SMS message that contains a link to your mobile web site. Your consumers can access your site by opening your SMS message instead of entering the URL address on the handset.

To distribute a link to your mobile web or WAP page, create a text file that contains the URL to your site (i.e the text http://wap.sl.se), save the file with a .lnk file extension and upload the .lnk-file to your InfoNU account. To automatically send back the link, select Configure Settings, SMS Signup settings so that people receive your .lnk file as a response when they sign up to your service.

The Future of Mobile Marketing

Handset manufacturers are now working hard to unify the user experience on mobile phones. This will make Java applications and mobile web pages look and feel the same way regardless of handset manufacturer.

Manufacturers are also implementing a video compression standard called h.264. This compression technique is twice as efficient as the one used today. If you ever have tried video calls and been disappointed, expect to experience higher image quality within a year or two. The h.264 compression technique will be used for video calls, mobile-TV (in the standard called DVB-H) and for video streaming. The telecommunication industry believes that h.264 will make video calls and mobile video streaming useful in practice.

In Part II of this article series, we will take a closer look at mobile applications and how marketers can design mobile chat, newsletters and community services in just a few minutes.

Anders Hansson is with IntelliTech Software AB, a mobile software development firm. The company is delivering consulting services for customers like Ericsson, Symbian, Sony-Ericsson and several European mobile operators. The company also develops the open mobile marketing platform InfoNU. For more information about IntelliTech, visit

[http://www.intellitech.se][http://www.intellitech.se].

This year, 2010, is apparently the year of the mobile. Any organisation dealing in digital media is talking about it, Wall Street analysts are lionising the potential and there are a growing number of major brands implementing their mobile strategy. Any international marketer worth their salt is plotting a course to get access to the pockets of the 4 billion mobile subscribers world-wide. Many organisations are now starting to meet the associated technology challenges head-on and this paper points the way for innovative brands to begin implementing high impact mobile initiatives immediately.

However, executing a mobile strategy today is an evolving process, and there are significant hurdles to overcome in constructing effective, broad-based, mobile initiatives. It is not just about delivering a new piece of technology (which is getting easier) but it is also about the application of that technology to the market you are addressing and how to get your customers embracing your mobile channel. Obviously, the need to create a compelling user experience is key to the success of your campaign. We have learned through painful experience that in reality your customers will try your mobile channel only once before deciding whether or not to give it ‘general air-play’.

Why is ‘going mobile’ so hard? In short, the mobile medium has many different players from carriers to handset manufacturers to platforms to content publishers and many others. There are few standards for moving content across carriers to different mobile devices and it is still a little daunting for the uninitiated to navigate. Despite the noise and the ‘explosive’ growth of this market there are only a handful of suppliers that understand how to produce and publish rich, compelling, relevant and engaging content across the multiplicity of mobile device types now available.

The first obstacle to overcome exists in the form factor of mobile devices. Consumer expectations of the interactive media experience have been shaped by the Internet, and the Internet experience does not map directly to the small screen size and is limited by the bandwidth of the mobile environment. Mobile initiatives must be conceived and designed specifically to support a compelling mobile experience. Our experience to-date has been that this is uncharted territory for the vast majority of mobile brand strategies and has been characterised more by trials than by national and international rollouts.

The next challenge is that, unlike the open, standards-driven Internet, the mobile world is highly fragmented. There are currently more than 30 major handset manufacturers producing over 500 different phones, with significant variations in operating systems, screen sizes, display resolution, processing speed, memory, and performance. These differences mean that mobile content and applications must be adapted to run on multiple, dissimilar devices, greatly complicating the development effort. Further variations in service delivery among more than 600 carriers add still more development complications and cost. For these reasons, many mobile campaigns today are limited either to one carrier and a handful of devices, which compromises reach, or to the most basic of content technologies, which compromises effectiveness.

Perhaps the most important question that needs answering is: “Do you believe the hype and if so, is the timing right for me to ‘go mobile’ now?” If the answer to both is ‘yes’ the next question is “How will I gain competitive advantages comparable to those of pioneering web initiatives a decade ago?”

Given that the mobile market is in a constant state of flux and the noise level is constantly increasing – what are the possibilities open to an innovative brand?

There are five distinct tried and trusted methods for extending mobile initiatives to new audiences, which are described as follows in the chronological order of their entrance to the general market.

1. Text messaging via SMS has universal reach, and offers simplicity. It’s also the most common non-voice use of mobile devices, accessed by anyone who texts friends and family or downloads ringtones and provides a solid delivery mechanism.

2. Rich content delivery via MMS (multimedia messaging service) delivers basic video, audio, and pictures in addition to text, and can be used for more colourful, animated enticements such as directions to a restaurant or a coupon for a film. SMS and MMS can team up, with SMS making the initial solicitation and MMS providing the delivery of rich content. On the downside, SMS/MMS offer very limited content delivery – only 160 characters. SMS, being text-only, can deliver just bare messages. While MMS adds basic multimedia, it and SMS share a further limitation in that they offer only two-way, walkie-talkie type communications. They are useful for alerting users to special offers and in following up offer acceptance by sending simple, static content. They do not provide an effective means to a brand experience and must also be used with caution; nobody likes receiving unwanted text messages on a mobile phone, or worse, getting stuck with usage charges.

3. The Mobile Web uses WAP (wireless application protocol) to access web sites. The WAP browser, which operates much like a computer-based browser but is simplified for the mobile environment, can deliver a much more satisfying user experience than SMS/MMS can, and is fully interactive. Mobile phones with browser capabilities are mainstream, and while usage is less common than SMS/MMS, approximately 75% of all mobile devices are Internet-enabled. What those users do with their WAP browsers differs markedly from their behaviour with computer browsers, as general web surfing on a mobile device just doesn’t work well. There’s no mouse, no proper keyboard, the connections are slower and web sites designed for computer access typically display awkwardly on small mobile screens. That makes the mobile web best suited to utilities that target specific audiences with tailored offerings. For example, an airline mobile service that displays flight status, schedule information, itineraries, and offers flight changes and check-in. In other words, delivering a limited portion of the content and functionality available at a brand’s full web site, formatted specifically for handsets. Having identified an appropriate application, the challenge of accommodating variations among devices and carriers remains.

4. Downloadable rich media applications that support a variety of environments including Java, BREW, Windows Mobile, Symbian, Android and iPhone, are now hitting the headlines. These applications enable a far richer user experience than do SMS/MMS or mobile web, with the addition of high-quality video and audio and a higher level of contextual presentation, such as menu choices that make optimum use of screen real estate at any given point in the user experience. Creating compelling mobile applications requires significantly more that simply deciding what content to include and where to reformat the full web site and necessitates the creation of fresh content and interaction designed and optimized specifically for the mobile experience. Even though most phones are rich-media capable, few rich media device independent applications exist. For example, Apple now boasts that there are more than 100,000 iPhone Applications or Apps ( http://bit.ly/803DzU ) for this specific device – but it’s highly unlikely that the vast majority of these will ever be ported to other handsets. That’s largely a development issue and means that the proliferation of these applications cannot be ubiquitous unless they are developed for every single type of smart phone. Unlike in the computer world, a Java version that works on one mobile device doesn’t necessarily work on other mobile devices. Given the proliferation of device-specific Java implementations, brands who choose to deliver rich media applications are often forced to choose which devices they’ll support, in order to control development and testing costs.

5. Flash Lite is a runtime environment specifically optimized for mobile phones. Flash Lite enables OEMs and operators to differentiate their devices via customized user interfaces, a more complete web experience, and the ability to access video and mobile content across devices.

Now we have covered what is available we should consider how a brand should start to implement these technologies. Most brands that have embarked on their mobile strategy have often commenced their initiative with a marketing focus and have largely limited this activity to SMS/MMS campaigns, using them with the most basic user interaction. Those who have ventured further typically partner with a vendor offering either mobile web or rich media expertise. Because of the inherent technology bias, this risks letting technology drive the implementation, rather than business goals driving the implementation. Ideally, a brand wanting to optimize their efforts would be best served by partnering with a vendor that can support their strategic initiative with whichever technology is best suited to the task, combining multiple technologies to support different aspects of the mobile initiative when appropriate. It would be a bold move to commence an initiative using ‘in-house’ resources that have no track record of success and at this stage of the market development there are a small but growing number of suppliers who offer robust and reliable development platforms – not dissimilar to the early days of the internet. The prudent choice should be a vendor who has been in the market for some time with a demonstrable track record of delivering exponential growth from the mobile channel.

If you are seriously interested in divining and executing your mobile strategy you will be glad you made the decision because the sooner you get started with high-impact mobile campaigns, the sooner you’ll have a serious competitive advantage in reaching those 4 billion global mobile phone subscribers.

In conclusion, there is now hard data ( http://bit.ly/4JJDq4 ) showing that the mobile internet is ramping up faster than desktop internet did. There currently exists an explosion in the growth of mobile data which is set to continue for some time. Mobile is here to stay and is only going to dwarf the first internet wave due to its ubiquity, necessity, convenience, and proximity to nearly everything we do.

Web: http://www.mobestar.com/
Mobile: http://m.mlite.co.uk/

In theory, the concept of mobile payments has a strong business case, given the high market penetration rates of mobile devices, such as cellular phones and PDA?s, in many parts of the world. In addition, mobile operators and financial institutions, through the use of these devices, envision an attractive way to enable their customers to make payments. On the consumer side, users can reap the benefits of convenience, permitting them to buy goods and services from any location.

In principle, a mobile device can be used as a POS (point of sale) tool. Mobile operators and financial institutions consider this concept as the next logical step in making mobile devices a trusted payment device for consumers, acting as a payment instrument supplementing cash, cheque, credit card and debit card.

Currently, financial institutions are rolling out wireless POS capabilities to merchants which are in-turn competing with a consumer?s mobile phone. Several new services have been introduced around the world in which merchants are accepting payments from wireless POS terminals. These wireless POS terminals, for example, allow merchants to offer home delivery services in which payments are presented and accepted upon delivery of goods or services at the consumer?s location.

Wireless POS terminals use the wireless networks of mobile operators to send payment instructions to a merchant acquirer?s payment server. Consequently, wireless POS services are classified as an extension of traditional payment services. Given that in some areas of the world almost everyone will soon own a mobile phone, and most merchant locations offer POS terminals as a form of payment, it is at least conceivable that the mobile device will take over a large part of the retail payment market.

Since wireless POS implementations are an extension of current payment infrastructures, users still need to use a credit or debit card to make purchases. The convenience associated with current wireless POS methods have to do with the fact that these terminals are brought to the location of the purchase. For example, in a restaurant environment with the user paying for their bill via debit card from their seat, or for their groceries which have been delivered to their front door.

Mobile devices enable the use of numerous services, services that do not need card readers, personal computers, and modem combinations or a merchant?s wireline POS terminal. Nowadays, mobile devices have an embedded chip that can be used to store information and provide secure authorization and identification.

The Need for Interoperability

But to make these services available to the majority of mobile users, mobile payment service providers need to roll out services that offer interoperability. There have been numerous mobile payment pilots conducted that enable mobile devices to be used as a payment option, some of which have advanced into full mobile payment services (e.g. PayPal, PayBox, MovilPago). To date, we?ve discovered that the key to providing a successful mobile payment service has to do with the benefits it gives the end user and the end user’s customers: convenience, security, and freedom being a few key elements.

Though the industry has a long way to go before mobile devices will become a consumer?s payment instrument of choice, to ensure the stability of a viable mobile payments infrastructure, collaboration is the key.

Both mobile operators and financial institutions have tried, with little success, to implement their own individual pilot projects. Both parties have encountered numerous difficulties. Mobile operators, for example, because of their extensive existing customer base, technical know-how and billing comprehension, seemed the most likely candidates to provide mobile payment services. However, problems associated with risk management and the collaboration of numerous providers needed to accomplish interoperability have arisen. Financial insitutions on the other hand are confronted with a limited number of users and high infrastructure costs. To remedy these problems, mobile operators and financial institutions have begun collaborating to jointly offer mobile payment services to their customers. For instance, leading Dutch direct bank ING/Postbank Nederland, has partnered with the Netherlands number three mobile carrier Telfort, to offer users mobile access to the bank?s retail applications and link user bank accounts to Telfort?s prepaid service top-up capabilities for account recharging. In this case, the fact that these two entities are taking advantage of their natural symbiosis is a big step in the right direction.

Right now there are four entities needed to make a payment via credit card (acquirers, issuers, merchants and consumers) to make a payment via mobile device, there are five (mobile operators, acquires, issuer, merchant and consumers). As a result, the ideal business model includes the cooperation between mobile operators, financial institutions, technology suppliers and industry associations to create a certain amount of standardization which will ensure the successful implementation of a strong mobile payments infrastructure.

Still, numerous issues, including limited functionality available through the current generation of networks as well as a lack of standards to name a few, are still hampering the efforts being carried out by these industry players. In addition, questions regarding successful revenue generating business models also remain.

Conclusion

As mentioned earlier, cell phone and PDA penetration rates are higher then they’ve ever been, with forecasted growth rates showing exponential increases in consumer adoption. Accordingly, industry focus should be centered around the business side. Right now it is not feasible for a mobile operator or a financial institution to role out competing services on a proprietary model that does not include interoperability. Mobile operators and financial institutions must work together to implement mobile payment services that marry a consumer?s bank account with their mobile subscription. Offering payment services should not be seen as a competitive advantage, but rather as a necessity which will drive the success of the rollout of mobile commerce.

Today we see several initiatives taking place including the creation of various industry associations designed to address the different issues associated with the mobile industry. With these activities underway-mobile operators and financial institutions are beginning to work together to roll out new payment services. Pre-paid top up, for example, is the first real commercial mobile payment application that is being introduced into several markets. Financial institutions and mobile operators are collaborating to enabling mobile subscribers to electronically pay for their pre-paid wireless accounts using several banking channels such as telephone banking, Internet banking, and ATM and mobile banking, completely automating the ?top-up? experience using SMS (Short Message Service).

Currently, payment instruments are stored in virtual wallets residing either on the mobile device or centralized on the open network service platform. Consumers register for the service through their financial institution, mobile operator or service provider, depending on how the service is setup. The registration is necessary to link the consumer?s subscription data with their financial information and provision the mobile device for the service. Future methods may see users using their mobile device as a way to simply access their bank accounts, whereby the mobile operator?s function will be simply to transport the data. In addition, smart cards issued by financial institutions may begin to become more prevalent.

As mobile services and infrastructures evolve we will begin to see the true notion of mobile payment instruments living up to the hype of ?anytime, anywhere payments.? Soon, mobile payments will become an integral part of consumer lifestyles, replacing the payment instruments we have hidden in our wallets today. It is clear, that the co-operation between mobile operators and financial institutions is needed to build a viable mobile payments offering. It is also clear that the next logical payments industry step is to provide consumers with the ability to make payments for goods and services on their mobile devices. The only true concept of ?anytime anywhere payments? is conceivable through access via a mobile device. ‘Where there’s a wireless, there’s a way’ and the key to the success of the industry is as simple as giving consumers what they want.

First and foremost, the mobile home collateral is considered personal property when it is located in a park. It has, historically, been a quickly depreciating asset. The costs associated with lending on this type of asset push many banks out of the market altogether. This leaves park-owners and private investors as the driving forces behind the mobile home rental arena as far as mobile home park financing is concerned.

A conventional financing program will not typically consider income from park-owned mobile rents for the debt service ability of a real estate loan. There are some higher rate alternative programs out there, which consider all park income – both mobile home rent and pad rent. The most common problem buyers have with these types of parks is the numbers sellers or Realtors provide them. They will often times consider all income when determining cap rates, value, etc. The incomes from mobiles are never used in determining an appraised real estate value. This is due to the fact that mobiles in parks are not real estate improvements. One cannot simply throw several different types of incomes together in the blender and determine a value based on a single cap rate. All parts are not equal. The income stream generated from park-owned mobile homes run different risks of interruption or loss than the income stream generated by a mobile pad. A safer income stream deserves a different valuation and also a different loan interest rate – a reflection of risk.

The easiest way to picture these types of parks is in two components. You have the real estate component, which consists of dirt and any verifiable land improvements. Typical mobile home park improvements may include mobile pads, RV pads, clubhouses, laundry room, pool, office, etc. The real estate value is largely determined by the normal operational income generated from real improvements. You also have the personal property component or chattel. Personal property may include mobiles, equipment, appliances, etc. There are finance products available for these chattel portions at higher rates, shorter amortizations, and shorter fixed periods than one might expect with a normal real estate loan.

These different streams of income deserve their own separate determinations for investment value. An income derived from rental real estate such as a mobile home park pad is viewed as more reliable and valuable than an income derived from personal property such as with a mobile home rental. The cap rate for a passive investment such as a mobile home park (considering pad rents only) may be in the 8% range in some markets whereas the cap rate for a more business intensive project such as mobile home or RV pad rentals may be in the 12% range for that same market. Obviously the actual cap rate will vary greatly across different markets, but a more risky income will still warrant a higher cap rate than a less risky income. This type of thinking suggests that $1 of income from a mobile pad is more valuable than $1 of income from a mobile home rental.

Just because two income streams are generated through real estate improvements does not mean they are equal still. Although RV pads can be valued as real estate, they are still more work intensive and their income streams less reliable than a mobile home pad and therefore warrant a higher cap rate in valuation. This is apparent in the market vacancies any underwriter will utilize in determining the stabilized cash flow of an RV rental property.

From an investor standpoint, reliable or easier-to-produce income is more valuable than income that takes more time to create or is less reliable. From a lending standpoint, reliable or easier-to-produce income contains less risk of interruption and therefore less risk of default.

Lenders will only accept real estate as collateral to secure a CMBS (commercial mortgage backed security). A CMBS is a loan that is secured against commercial real estate and offers the flexibility to lenders of being sold much like any other bond security traded on the market today. This type of money has become much more prevalent in recent years. Many national lenders today, with products typically more aggressive than a local bank may offer, employ this type of lending structure. Very similar in investor consequence, a CDO or CDS structure may also be employed today.

The issue of different asset-types (real estate and personal) being sold simultaneously often leaves inexperienced buyers in the middle of a purchase contract with a need for additional cash to cover mobile value since most lenders can only offer loan dollars against the real estate value. Real estate loans are not the answer without considering some type of cross-collateralization, which is atypical of most conventional finance options. One of the most common solutions is to have the seller carry a note for the value of some or all of the mobiles. If seller financing doesn’t pan out, there are a number of private investors who may be able to offer a variety of options depending on the situation. The key phrase to remember in securing financing on property such as a mobile not considered real estate is, “Chattel Mortgage.” In commercial real estate, this term is typically reserved for a situation where a mobile home is in a park and not occupying its own tax lot.

There is an occupancy issue to consider. There is usually less incentive keeping a mobile renter in the park. A tenant owning their mobile is much less likely to move out than a mobile renter. The costs and efforts to move a mobile are often a factor helping to safeguard long-term occupancy for tenants owning their mobiles.

There is also an added expense to consider. Any person in a rented mobile is less likely to take care of it. Mobile owners are responsible for the maintenance and repair of the home. When a mobile can no longer be rented due to use, the owner must pay to dispose of it.

There are many different benefits and detriments to owning mobiles in a park. Parks can be very profitable when they collect mobile rent on top of pad rent. The determining factor of whether or not to employ this type of rental style park is usually, “How much do you want to put into the project?” If you are looking to get into a property and put the time and work into it, park owned mobiles could be a great way to maximize cash flow – be sure to approach the financing appropriately. For the passive investor who likes to collect checks every month, a pad rent only park is the route of choice – expect to receive the most competitive rates and terms.

Colby Callahan Commercial Loan Officer Business Loan Store http://Mobile-Home-Park-Loans.com

Mobile phone upgrades are easy to do – if you know where and how to do it.

A “mobile phone upgrade” is where an existing customer of a network (eg T-Mobile, Vodafone, Orange, O2, 3G, Virgin etc), who has been with that network for about 1 year since getting their last mobile phone, gets a new mobile phone from the network at a free, or cheap discount price, in return for agreeing to stay with that network for another 12 months, under a 12 month contract agreement. The customer keeps their existing mobile phone number, and stays with the same network. This is called a “mobile phone upgrade” – often it is a free mobile phone upgrade!

To get the best offer for a free or cheap mobile phone upgrade you must understand this. The mobile phone networks pay a mobile phone dealer more for a new customer (new mobile phone contract) than they do for a mobile phone upgrade customer. This odd situation has been the same for many years. The only network that seems to pay mobile phone dealers nearly as much for an upgrade customer as for a new free mobile phone customer is Three (also known as 3 or 3G). The other mobile phone networks simply do not seem to value their existing customers as much!

The craziness of this situation is that it encourages you to be disloyal to your current network.

What does this means to you? How can you get the best deal from knowing all this, so you can get a free mobile phone upgrade AND get other benefits? Read on …

The amount that a mobile phone dealer can give to you will depend on how much money he is making. If he is making more money from a ‘new’ mobile phone contract customer than for an upgrade customer, then he will be able to give the ‘new’ mobile phone contract customer a bigger discount or a free mobile phone or maybe more!

Now, did you know that instead of upgrading your phone on the same network (where you probably will not get such a good deal or a free mobile phone etc), you can switch to a NEW and different network AND keep your existing mobile phone number? This is true.

Now, knowing that you can keep your mobile phone number, and that you can usually get a better deal as a ‘new’ customer on another network, what are you going to do?

You can simply become a ‘new’ customer on a different network … this new network then treat you as a new customer, give you all the free mobile phone bonuses and gifts etc, AND you keep your mobile phone number!

So by simply looking around at all the offers available to you on all the other networks

The next article will tell you how you can get an even better deal …

—————————————————————————————-

Free Mobile Phones – How to get an even better Upgrade

Before you take the jump and switch to a different network for your free mobile phone upgrade, think about this …

Imagine you call your current network to tell them that you are thinking of leaving them to switch to another mobile network. Often that person you speak to will be on a commission to keep your business ie they will earn a bit of money if they can convince you to stay with that mobile phone network.

This means that you can use this to your advantage.

Tell them that you have had a great offer from another network (and do not lie – they will most likely know exactly what you could and could not get with another network). Simply ask them if they can equal or better the deal offered by this other network.

If they can equal it, then it is probably not worth the hassle of switching mobile phone networks and the paperwork. It is not too much hassle to do the switch but obviously it is easier to stay with your current mobile phone network.

Free mobile phone upgrades can be got in this way quite easily by simply understanding how the system works and how the money works in mobile phones and free mobile phone upgrades.

So next time, simply ask you current mobile phone network if they will better the free mobile phone offer from another network. Always ask if they can better the offer – don’t ask them to equal it or they will only equal it.

Good luck.

There is more tips than this at free-mobile-phone-upgrades.blogspot.com – other tips on how to get the best free mobile phone upgrade.

Duncan Elliott runs a number of mobile phone websites including http://www.mobile-phone-upgrade.com and [http://www.free-mobile-phone-uk.org.uk/]

Introduction

In countless vertical business markets, mobile professionals are roaming far from their corporate campuses with laptops and cellular phones in tow. The increasing ubiquity of Wi-Fi hotspots and high-speed cellular networks, in part, has made these road warriors depend on real-time access to email, calendars and other corporate information systems.

Similarly, Sales force workers equipped with mobile devices such as Tablet PCs and ruggedized handhelds can be found in retail stores, on construction sites, in manufacturing plants, on service calls and everywhere else business is being done. Mobility gives them the tools they need for order-entry, shipment tracking and business intelligence reports. The use of mobile devices increases accuracy and eliminates redundancy, so there’s no need to carry around a stack of manuals.

Throughout business locations such as factories, offices, hospitals and other facilities a new breed of mobile worker, often referred as corridor warrior are seen armed with lightweight, handheld devices linked to wireless local area network (WLANs). The real-time communications and information access made possible through these complete mobile solutions is redefining the ways professionals perform at their jobs and consequently the costs of doing business.

These solutions are helping to raise the standards that both businesses and their workers are held to. This White Paper will discuss how the benefits of mobile solutions, are empowering Enterprises and their employees to improve revenue, engage in industry best practices and offer the best practices possible with its new features, functions and capabilities.

Obstacles in traditional SFA

A firm that has mobile sales force has been facing a lot of obstacles in recent times. They must continue realigning as the market changes. Earlier SFA Applications served the basic needs of field workers such as access to emails, contact management, calendaring and scheduling. Even though these features remain the dominant in SFA, the portfolio of capabilities has started to expand. A firm must adjust the pace of rebuilding the mobile force to match expected obstacles. The common anticipated obstacles are

• Focus – Wasting time, money and resources on uninterested prospects. Instead of focusing on best prospects, sales force spends time on all the prospects.
• Access – The Sales person often are not able to satisfy customer needs as they do not have access to the information that are sitting elsewhere in a database back at the office.

This led to the expansion of Mobile Sales Force Automation.

Expansion in Portfolio of Capabilities

• Quick Access to Information – Imagine having outdated and inadequate information when you are in a sales call. Sales people should have critical facts and figures on the field that help them to close a deal. By providing the sales people with quick access and communicate information to and from the field allows the sales people to get the most from the time they spend with the customer.
• Shortened Sales Cycle – Sales people can access current product information, check inventory and quote prices during a customer meeting which gives an outlook that they are very responsive. During the sales call customer can be informed about their accounts receivable status and credit standing with the push of a button. By using their mobile device the sales professionals can remove tedious tasks and reduce the delay in sending accurate information about customer meetings. Remote order entry capability also eliminates manual input of data into ERP. With these sales cycles are shortened, accurate information is gathered, customer is satisfied and revenue is increased.
• Sync Capability – Synchronization provides a simple method of sharing data and merging new and updated information between offline users and the Mobile Server. When the offline user comes online he should be able to retrieve the updated information from backend server through mobile server and the information in his mobile device should be updated with the backend server. This ensures timeliness and accuracy of the information. The changes made outside the wireless coverage should be reliably conveyed to the backend. This ensures the sales professionals have most recently updated information and at the same time they need not reenter data again and again into the database. For Example, the corporate network of a major banking industry is designed to provide sales professional with reliable real-time access to their server. In a customer’s place network coverage is not stable always, it gets lost. They need to use their mobile device and enter data as they interact with customer and then make that data available to the server as soon as the connection returns.
• Always On Sometimes Connected – During sales call, sales professionals are in consistent time constraint. They need to deliver their messages efficiently as well as effectively so that they don’t waste the face time with the prospects. The required boot of the laptop can waste a considerable amount of time in front of the prospect, which makes it less optimal. In such cases, sales professionals needs a mobile device which can help them access critical information in a small screen. “Always On capability is a must and the sales professionals can connect sometime to retrieve information.” An efficient and powerful search capability is an important requirement.
• Security – With the growing functionalities in today’s SFA security plays a very important role. The primary security requirement is that all users should authenticate themselves as a verified user into the corporate systems. This ensures the sales professional accessing into critical information is an authorized user. And also an insecure connection or a lost device can cause a loss to company’s proprietary data, in turn lowers competitive advantage. Mobility devices should have strong encryption capabilities for application data as it is transmitted over a network using a standard communication. A strong encryption system such as Triple AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) or DES (Data Encryption Standard) is necessary in ensuring the application data on the device is protected. In case of any lost or stolen devices, they should have the ability to remotely disable it.

SFA Mobile applications open up new frontiers

Recent advances in both wired and wireless Internet access solutions have spurred faster growth of mobile sales force population in the last couple of years, with hosted applications promising to open up new frontiers. The following features emerged into SFA applications, assures companies to maximize its capability to effectively and efficiently manage mobile users and devices.

• Policy-based Management – Can provide a way to allocate network resources, primarily network bandwidth and security (firewalls), according to defined business policies. Users can be defined as individuals, groups, communities, and have specific management capabilities applied to them. This can be easily changed, and can be tied to a directory.
• Broad functionality – Can function with a wide variety of applications and data requirements. Most of the applications have the needed interfaces to allow customization and additions.
• Directory integration – Can interface with already defined directory structure and policies so a stand-alone or duplicate directory is not needed.
• Scalability – Can provide management for a large number of users with a large number of devices.
• Single console for all network/application/device/security – can provide a single console from which it can define, control, deploy and maintain all aspects of the device, application, network and security.
• Web-based console – can be managed from a web-based console from any standard browser, allowing management from local or remote locations, and on a variety of devices.
• Support for diversity in devices, platforms, and networks – supports a variety of devices, connections and platforms, and will continue to expand on the device types and OS flavors.
• Security components – Provides at least a minimum set of security capabilities within the product. Can be integrated with higher-level security tools.
• Bandwidth aware – can adjust for whatever bandwidth is available for the particular connection (e.g., delivering massive file updates on a slow connection).
• Dashboard – can provide a management dashboard of information on processes, users, devices, performance, etc.
• Backend management integration – can integrate effectively with other back-end management infrastructure already deployed within the organization without needing to retrain existing staff already familiar with the application.

Emerging trends in Mobile Capabilities

Today, an assortment of technology is used by sales professionals, ranging from laptop computers to consumer-grade personal digital assistants (PDAs) to beepers and cell phones. These top features provide a solution for everything a sales professional may need while out of the office.

• Integration – Ability to integrate with enterprise-level business applications.
• Operating System – Defining a standardized OS environment has greatly eased deployment of devices. Much like the PC desktop environment, the ability to deploy a single platform to all users means allowing a uniform distribution of SW, and a consolidated support requirement. Can support Familiar Microsoft Windows Mobile-based operating system.
• Deployment platform – Companies ultimately deploy applications on one of two major platforms: Microsoft .Net, or Java. However, many organizations will deploy both. Can run in either environment (e.g., running a JVM on a Windows Mobile device supporting .Net).
• Third party application availability – Many application vendors now offer mobile extensions to their application suites, providing a convenient means of extending applications to a mobile sales professional. However, not all vendors provide such capability, nor do they support all platforms. Third party middleware extensions provide needed functionality when not available within the application.
• Asset Management – Deploying devices to users is only part of the challenge. The greater part of the challenge is managing the deployed assets. Devices deployed in enterprise settings provide the appropriate tools to mange the devices adequately, even when used with a third party asset management application.
• Connectivity – Companies are relying on the notion of the “real time enterprise” which requires up-to-date data acquisition of business activity information, as well as empowering employees with the data necessary to make the proper decisions. Mobile devices offer connectivity, even if not immediately used with the expansion of WiFi deployments within companies, as well as in public places. Can also allow a choice of radio connectivity options.
• Battery Life – Battery life varies greatly depending on usage factor but the bottom line for most users is, can mobile devices get the user through the workday without a recharge? Most consumer PDA devices are challenged to provide a full day’s operation when using a wireless connection (WiFi). Can provide sufficient powerful batteries to provide at least one day’s operation, and allow full recharge overnight. Further, can provide field replaceable battery, as most batteries will only withstand about 300 charge/discharge cycles.
• Data Capture – Data capture options provide linear and two-dimensional scanning or imaging.
• Voice telephony – Voice telephony for push-to-talk (PTT), peer-to-peer (P2P), private branch exchange (PBX), one-to-one or one-to-many communications.

Future Technology Accelerators

Tablet PC

Tablet PCs combine the touch screen and handwriting features of the PDA with the computing power of a notebook computer in a compact and light weight design. End-user experiences the same look and feel in the office as in the field. Other advances in battery life and wireless capabilities are also eagerly anticipated.

Voice

Emerging technologies that allow natural text to speech dictation will allow easier data capture by both sales professionals and other members of the sales channel. Such services can run on mobile devices or via telephone services to a central server. Such solutions will tie directly into sales and marketing applications and can help increase the amount of useful data that can be captured in the field.

Extending into Field Analytics

As wireless networks improve, our ability to access information throughout the enterprise increases. Through integration of analytics into a mobile environment, we bring the sales professional in closer contact with the home office and help them to better highlight customer needs. We will be able to better measure and predict behavior and the interactions with the customer and, in turn, support changes in the business landscape, such as product launches and formulary changes.

RFID [Spell out] – Radio Frequency Identification

An RFID system comprises three main elements: electronic tags, tag readers and software to store collected data.

The tags, which consist of a silicon chip and an antenna, provide each individual object to which they are attached with a unique identifier. When scanned, the tag transmits a wireless signal to the reader, which in turn sends the data to a database. The reader can also write information to the tag if required.

RFID technology is becoming prevalent in logistics where the movement of mobile tags, for example on pallets of consumer goods, is read by static readers, say, in goods in/out bays of a warehouse. However, for Sales Force Applications, this concept is reversed: the tags are static and the readers are mobile, i.e. carried by the sales professional. Tags can be attached, say, to a fixed location for proof of attendance, or to a specific item of machinery to be checked.

Top 5 reasons to make SFA MOBILE

• Company conducts business in a national or global market.
• Sales professionals spend more than 25% of the time out of office.
• Business depends on quick and informed decisions from people who are frequently on the road.
• Sales professionals need to have quick access to information and provide quick answers to the customers when they are on the call.
• Nimbleness is a competitive advantage for the sales professional.

Sample Case Study

Challenge

A famous Banking company needed a robust tool for managing sales leads and opportunities with visibility of the sales pipeline. The company desired a web-based, customizable solution that would be a good fit with that company’s mobility offerings to their sales professionals. It also desired a low-risk solution that could scale as the company grews. They also wanted their sales professionals to have up-to-date information about the leads they handle.

Solution

They selected ZSL’s middleware technology for its wireless capabilities, ease of deployment, configuration and customization. Through ZSL’s middleware technology the sales professionals were able to wirelessly access the provisioning functionalities such as sales order management systems and hosted prospect database. In addition, they were impressed with ZyPrism’s ability to synchronize data’s with reliable real-time access.

Results

Because of availability of data at real-time sales professionals were able to respond to customers at a quicker rate, shorten the sales cycle, increased their productivity and greater revenue generated. Because leads are pushed via alerts directly to sales professional’s Mobiles, sales professionals started experiencing faster response times to people who register interest via the web or its sales call center.

Conclusion

By providing quick access to information to sales professionals available at back-end data and applications helps them to shorten the sales cycle, gather accurate information, improves customer satisfaction and increase revenue. Sales professionals become more responsive to customers through expansion of capabilities in SFA.

With Synchronization feature in SFA sales professionals are equipped with real time and updated information, which in turn helps them to provide customers with up-to-date prices and inventory available. Remote order entry capabilities reduce the burden of entering the data again in the database residing at the server and help them to close the sale quickly and efficiently.

Business productivity and customer satisfaction can be achieved when mobile and wireless solutions are used wisely. Mobile solutions have truly come of age and can literally transform business to newer heights. Now is the time to evaluate how becoming more mobile sales professionals can be more productive. Its time to craft your mobile strategy otherwise your competitors are likely to go mobile giving them the competitive advantage.

Expansion in the capabilities of Sales force automation applications holds great promise for improving the efficiency of mobile sales professional and reducing the overall cost of sales. The enterprise network should be properly equipped to provide reliability, security, bandwidth, adequate remote connectivity and management controls. Mobility can give all the business advantages with these capabilities.

About the Author

John Solomon is with ZSL. ZSL realizes that salespeople are mobile by definition. ZSL uses technology to make sales team more focused and successful. ZSL’s solution is customized in such a way that sales professionals get the direction they need and managers get the information they need. The bottom line is increased profits.

ZSL is an ISO 9001 certified provider of Onshore, Offshore & Near shore technology services. ZSL offers substantial cost savings and enhanced performance associated with a secure and effectively managed global development model. For over 10 years, ZSL has been partnering with a loyal following of clients seeking to leverage our proven delivery methodology, as well as 24/7 access to the very best technical resources and development tools available anywhere.

http://www.zslinc.com

This mobility of the so called mobile rigs, would consequently give way to the evolvement of the generations of mobile phone that we have today. Originally, mobile phones were permanently installed in the vehicles, but as time went on, it gained more mobility when the later versions came out with equipment with a cigarette lighter plug, for the 12 volt power that it required to operate. This made this mobile set to be unplugged and taken away to be used as mobile or as portable phones.

The idea of patching the vehicle mounted phones, incorporating certain modifications, to the telephone network was evolved and tested by the Swedish police in 1946 for use in police cruisers. It was found that the car battery would run out after half a dozen calls were made. Towards the end of 1940s, the so called radio-telephones began to be available publicly in the United States. Since the switching technology was not as advanced as it is today, these phones had to be manually patched into telephone network for the purpose of a meaningful communication.

Erricsson first developed the first fully automatic mobile phone system, which was called Mobile Telephone system A (MTA). This was released commercially in Sweden in 1956. This was the first time that a mobile phone operated without any manual intervention, but the disadvantage was that it weighed 40Kg. The next version, Mobile Telephone system B (MTB), an upgraded version with transistors, used dual-tone multi-frequency signaling, weighing only 9kg and was introduced in 1965. The product closed down in 1983 while it has 600 subscribers using it.

The first fully successful and commercial mobile phone networks were the Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) network in Finland, launched in 1971. ARP is sometimes viewed as the 0G version of the cellular network, being considered to be slightly above the previous proprietary and limited coverage networks.

First Generation Mobile IG

Mobile technology and the growth in mobile telephony were built on the concept of communication networks that would provide for voice and data communication throughout a wide geographic area. The system would divide large geographic areas into small radio cell areas that are interconnected with each other. Each cell coverage area would have one or several transmitters and receivers that communicate with mobile telephones within that cell. It is this cellular concept that has given the name – cellular technology. This architecture, would allow you to maintain a continuous communication as you move from one cell to the other, and as you leave one cell and move into the next, the previous transmitter/receiver would hand over the call to the cell where you presently are, maintaining a seamless communication while you are moving.

When the true mobile telephony evolved commercially, it was the first generation systems (1G). These were analog systems, circuit-switched. The primary disadvantages were that the voice quality was bad, hand-off operation was not reliable, the capacity of accommodating enough simultaneous calls was low and there was no security. Mobile technology as we know today, started to evolve during 1970s, which was put under trial at Chicago in 1973. The system used a technology called Advanced Mobile Phone Service (AMPS), operating in the 800MHz band. For several reasons, the break-up of AT&T being one, the system could not be launched commercially before 1983. That launch occurred in Chicago in 1983, with other cities following rapidly. Japan launched the AMPS system in 1979 and the Europeans, being active in the field of their own mobile technology, launched their system in 1981. This was launched in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Finland. The Europeans had a different technology and they called it Nordic Mobile Telephony (NMT), operating in the 450-MHz band. Later the NMT was developed to work on 900MHz bandwidth and became known as NMT900. Consequently the British came out with their own technology in 1985 which they called Total Access Communications System (TACS), which operated in the 900MHz bandwidth. TACS is, in reality, a modified version of AMPS.

Motorola DynaTAC 8000X was the first hand-held mobile phone that was commercially introduced in the year 1983 after receiving due approvals. Consequently mobile phones started to take shape through the 1980s with the introduction of the cellular concept in mobile phones, and the creation of multiple base stations relatively close to each other with the protocols to switch between the cells, when a mobile phone moved from one cell to the other. The technology was completely based on analog transmission systems. The mobile phones were larger than what we have today and were designed to be permanently installed in the cars, getting the name ‘car phone’.

The first mobile phone service with roaming was started in Saudi Arabia in the year 1981. The system was called Nordic Mobile Telephony (NMT) and was manufactured by Svenska Radio Aktiebolaget (SRA). It was after one month of the introduction that SRA started country based roaming. Soon mobile communication became a necessity with many other countries, and the world ventured into the technology. Although many technologies were developed during this time, particularly in Europe, AMPS, NMT, and TACS remained the most successful of them all. These are known to be the first generation (IG) mobile systems and it is said that they are still in service today. The success of the first generation of mobile telephony experienced success but remained with the disadvantage of not having adequate capacity to accommodate handling of substantial subscriber calls. The system had the capability to handle the capacity of large numbers of subscribers, but when the subscribers started to grow in millions, deficiency in handling of the calls appeared in the design of the system, mainly in the densely populated urban areas. Limitation of handling subscribers was not the only problem. The other major problem which came up was fraud which became a major concern. Steps were taken and the 2G technology began to evolve.

Second Generation Mobile2G

This saw the evolvement of the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM), the original acronym of which is Groupe Spécial Mobile. GSM is a global digital radio system that uses Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) technology. This technology in GSM, enabled subscribers to operate on the same radio channel simultaneously by sharing time slots on full duplex mode, where both can talk at once. Half duplex mode is used in a walkie-talkie, where one person can transmit one at a time.

GSM is a digital cellular technology that was initially created to provide a single-standard pan-European cellular system. The development of GSM was started in 1982 and the first commercial GSM digital cellular system was activated in 1991. Being the most popular standard, GSM is used by over 2 billion people across more than 212 countries and territories. This technology has made international roaming very much possible, enabling the subscribers to use their phones in many parts of the world. GSM is completely based on digital signalling, which meant more clarity in speech transmission. With the evolvement of this technology the second generation (2G) of mobile telephony came into existence.

The GSM mobile phone works on various frequency bands, which are allocated differently to the countries throughout the world. These frequency bands are as follows-

850 MHz (824.2 – 848.8 MHz Tx; 869.2 – 893.8 MHz Rx)

900 MHz (880-2 – 914.8 MHz Tx; 925.2 – 959.8 MHz Rx)

1800 MHz (1710.2 – 1784.8 MHz Tx; 1805.2 – 1879.8 MH Rx)

1900 MHz (1850.2 – 1909.8 MHz Tx; 1930.2 – 1989.8 MHz Rx)

Rx represents receive mode while Tx is the transmit mode.

The GSM phones in North America and Canada operates on 850MHz and 1900MHz bands which are different from the frequency bands in Europe, with a result that North America is set apart from the rest of the world. This is the reason that if you live in the United States and even if you have a GSM phone, it becomes doubtful if it will work outside North America and Canada, though in some countries you may find one of the frequency bands matching one of the operating frequency.

As GSM evolved, the backward compatibility was retained, for example packet data capabilities was added to the consequent releases by means of General Packet Radio Service (GPRS), featuring data speeds up-to 177kilobits/second. High speed data transmission has also been introduced with Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution (EDGE) providing enhanced GPRS capability. EDGE provides a greater speed of up-to 470 kilobits/second, although the consumers could only realise a speed of 100 kilobits/second on average.

The idea of ‘roaming’ provided the foundation of GSM, which allowed subscribers from other networks and countries to call cell phones anywhere in the world. Behind this simple sounding process, there are some 600+ GSM network that exist in this world, and it is estimated that more than 30,000 agreements, concerning roaming, is in place between the operators, with more being added everyday. Therefore a complex process of information gathering of all the roaming calls and its subscriber details are constantly being updated in the relevant database, which takes a standard approach to the charges being incurred for each individual roaming connection being set up.

The 2G system brought in various applications in mobile telephony. Besides voice, it supports messaging and high speed data, with advanced services such as voice mail and paging, which are often bundled into a basic service program and ofcourse the web service.

Third Generation Mobile 3G

Shortly after the introduction of the 2G networks, the development of the third generation (3G) network was started, where many of the contenders with many different standards were pushing their own technology. 3G is the generic name for a set of mobile technologies, which used a whole lot of high tech infrastructure networks, handsets, base stations, switches and other equipment, which enabled subscribers to attain higher mode of applications through their phone. These are typically high-speed Internet access, data, video and CD-quality music services.

Quite different to the 2G systems, the 3G systems have been defined and specified in the International Mobile Telecommunications-2000 (IMT-2000) standarisation process. IMT-2000 project, which is the 3G systems, have been developed by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). The project specifically specified the requirement of the 3G system rather than standarising on a technology. For example, 2Mbit/s maximum data rate indoors, 384kbit/s outdoors. But somehow the concept of a unified standard broke down and several different standards have been introduced.

3G digital cellular systems uses radio channels that have a wider bandwidth and uses Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA), which has a wider bandwidth than 2G digital cellular systems using CDMA, such as, GSM or IS-95 CDMA. WCDMA is normally deployed in a 5MHz channel plan. CDMA is a digital wireless technology which enables multiple subscribers to share radio frequencies without interfering with each other. GSM is a 2G technology and uses TDMA, providing data speed of 9.6kbps/14.4kbps. GPRS was brought in as an interim technology towards 3G, which provided a speed of up-to 177kilobits/second. This then came to be known as 2.5G system. The use of 2G systems may fade away in 10 to 15 years time, with the use of a newer and better Universal Mobile Telephony System (UMTS) technology. In Europe, 3G Wide Band CDMA (W-CDMA) networks are known as UMTS, which is another name for (W-CDMA)/3G services.

Key features of IMT-2000 are:

High degree of commonality of design worldwide.

Compatibility of services within IMT-2000 and with the fixed networks.

High quality.

Small terminal for worldwide use.

Worldwide roaming capability.

Capability for multimedia applications, and a wide range of services and terminals.

3G networks are not upgrades of 2G systems, but are entirely different technology network, providing a whole lot of enhanced features than the 2G and 2.5G systems. 2.5G network is an enhancement of 2G system, towards 3G. Japan was the first country to introduce 3G networks in a large commercial scale, with 40% of the mobile telephony subscribers using 3G, pushing 2G on the way out. The year 2006 saw the transition from 2G to 3G network in Japan, with upgrades to the next 3.5G stage with 3Mbit/s data rates being underway.

3G Cell phone use for the USA and Overseas. Third generation gsm cell phones for rent and sale. In 99% of the world the local cellular service standard is called GSM. We use this in the states as well. When combined with a SIM CARD (which usually goes under the battery of the phone) the phone is able to communicate and the SIM CARD also holds the telephone number and memory for pre-paid credit. Rates can be extremely low using this system. For example in 99% of all SIM CARDS incoming calls are free and calls to the states can cost a trifle. from Australia 27 cents. Yes, USA Dollar cents! There are today even prepaid service providers in the USA offering rates of 10 cents per minute to call anywhere in the US to any type of phone. No contracts, no credit card checks, no bills. Pre-paid always means no minimums no contracts, no obligations. You only pay for the calls made. You’ll need an unlocked GSM tri-band or quadband UNLOCKED phone. You can buy factory unlocked phones and sim cards for more than 170 or the 193 countries on earth from htt://http://www.planetomni.com Tel. # 800-514-2984

Mobile strategy

This paper assumes your organisation has an established and accepted business case for mobility and you are now ready to proceed. When implementing a mobility solution the impacts are not just on the actual end-user but also the subtle and long-lasting effect to your I.T. strategy and implementation. Over the past decade we have seen the scope of I.T. grow from a private internal infrastructure view to publish information to external public access via the internet. I.T. is now faced with providing external access to internal systems information and must handle a new set of questions; how to support a broad range of mobile devices? How to manage access to information on internal systems by these devices? How to provide a secure and reliable experience?

Opening up the enterprise systems to mobile users requires careful planning to reduce the impact of change to the key stake holders; the end-users and the I.T. management. A strategy for mobility must include looking at the areas of:

• Mobile devices and device management
• Communications (wireless and wired), protocols and costs
• Mobile applications, customisation and usability
• Back-office data requirements and how the data integration points
• Centralised mobile access platform for how data is accessible while mobile
• Security for authentication and encryption
• Solution delivery and pricing models

The desired outcome of analyzing these points will provide the functional requirements, usability and structural design represented as a mobile systems architecture for your enterprise. The considerations of these points are discussed in this paper.

Device and device management

The pace of technology for the mobile worker coming to market continues to increase, notebook and laptop sales now have surpassed desktop PC sales and the billions of mobile phones sold are increasingly capable of data applications. There is also a complete range of devices in the cross-over between these extremes comprising of smart phones, PDA’s, handheld clamshells, tablets, and more. There is a seeming less unlimited number of form factors available, different screen sizes, some rotatable, input methods (keyboard, numeric keypad, pen, finger, scanners for barcode and RFID, speech, and more), processor types and performance, memory sizes from Kilobytes to Gigabytes, ruggerdised construction and not least of all the operating systems and application environments.

From an device selection point of view, the only reliable rule is to expect a mixed device environment as today’s standard is likely to be unavailable in 24 months. However, minimizing I.T. costs and resources is about adopting and enforcing standards, so what is the solution? For mobility, the answer is to select the appropriate device that fits the requirements of the end-users, and use a mobility device management platform that can run across all the devices in the fleet. The mobility platform abstracts the management of the devices, hiding the individual differences.

A mobility platform must enable the management of the devices for enterprise applications, including configuring communications and updating of the applications on the devices to an individual user or groups of users.

Communications

In many ways mobile applications that can replace current manual paper based systems, may seem to require only limited communication methods for swapping the collected data to back-office systems. However, a simple requirement as this can lead to many options, a user could plug the device in to a phone line modem or even an intranet-connected PC to synchronise data, or should a wireless network be used such as a cellular network or a WiFi hotspot? Each method has it’s own costs, performance and latencies, availability, infrastructure investments and security ramifications.

Advanced mobile applications that require more immediacy and collaborative solutions will require push capability that allows the back-office to send notifications in real-time to the devices.

Creating or buying mobile applications that run efficiently over one chosen communications network such as a wired LAN may perform poorly when changing to a wireless network. Conversely, when optimised for a low-bandwidth high latency dial-up or cellular network the same application may be unable to take advantage of the high-bandwidth WiFi networks or third generation wireless.

The best course of action is to select the most appropriate communications network(s) for the application requirements and use a mobility platform which removes the details of communications from the application. A Wireless Application Gateway (WAG) that manages communication between the device and back-office will optimise the communications. It also provides value added capability such as push notification support and compression irrespective of the chosen network.

Client access modes

Wired networks that have been around for decades provide a reliable and relatively high speed communication channel to back-office systems with several key enterprise application models existing as thin client terminal (citrix, web), and multi-tier (client, server and database logical tiers) thick clients. The separation of application execution and presentation to the user is largely an IT management issue and a key driver for which model is chosen. Both models tend to assume a communications connection is available to manage transactional integrity (record locking) and sharing resources in real-time.

For mobility, with its unreliable communications nature it is time to re-assess the appropriate access models. Networks are increasing in performance, however, the inherent nature of wireless means that coverage will never be ubiquitous, and interference will continue to have latency well above that of the wired networks, applications that run well on the wired network will not likely work well over wireless in all conditions.

The two most conventional methods were to chose between a thin or thick client model. Thin clients are typically a web browser or specially built client such as citrix, where the network must be available for the application to function. These thin client solutions have been unsuccessful in a number of enterprise mobility solutions due to the lack of capability of mobile web browsers and frustrating usability issues for end-users. Thick clients provide a fast, response and optimal user interface but suffer from the burden of managing and updating deployments.

Again, a mobility platform provides a solution as a best of both models, the so named, “smart” client model. This enables the optimsied experience of the thick client with the dynamic capability of the thin client. Applications and modules can be dynamically deployed to the mobile devices to provide newer functionality without the administrative burden of updating each device or finding out which software is installed.

Mobile applications

Most organisations that have invested in their own employee data collection processes and back-office systems are unlikely to find a pre-built mobile application will be an exact match. The most common choice is to take an existing application and re-train staff, or to create a customised solution that is tailor made and can grow as organizational needs demand.

Selecting a platform which can provide a rich but simple toolkit for creating mobile applications is essential to success. The application can then mirror current forms and processes which aid in reducing the impact of change to the end-users. The toolkit approach must encompass not only the user interface but the data structures and back-office communications as well, providing a one stop location for building a complete solution.

Many I.T. projects fail or exceed budgets because be-spoke software developments have complexity that is underestimated or the initial requirements were unclear. A mobility platform that targets non-programmers, such as business process engineers, keeps the focus on the business solution. Additionally, coupled with a device management platform, is the ability to easily deploy new versions of the application quickly for field testing and user acceptance.

Systems integration

Often quoted about standards, is that there are so many to choose from, and this is no truer than with Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) where each system or family of systems will have particular protocols for data exchange, typically ranging from the simplest text file import/export to the most complex information message bus brokers. New standards continue to emerge as the data access requirements and management change to adopt new capabilities.

Designing mobile applications to communication with a particular back-office system may seem to be the quickest and easiest way to move forward, but this locking in to a particular protocol will create a problem when the server system is changed or simply updated. Instead building mobile systems that are loosely connected to back-office systems is essential to success.

A mobility platform should provide a range of integration capabilities that are independent of the mobile application and can change by I.T. administration. The integration options should include how data is represented and persisted (such as raw text files, and XML) and the protocols used for sharing (such as network drive shares, FTP, HTTP or enterprise message brokers). Full audit logs are required to determine a history of data integration.

Security

For I.T. system security is the highest priority and protecting company information is paramount. The growth of internet technologies for accessing content has been paralleled with the development of encryption, identification and authentication. Enterprise firewalls, Virtual Private Networks (VPN), intrusion detection, central authentication servers are the norm for keeping intruders out.

Mobility has the potential to compromise a number of these standard security systems and weaken then protection of the enterprise networks allowing unauthorized users to gain access via security holes, or to obtain corporate information from a lost of stolen mobile device. Security options must be enforced on the mobile device and during communication with the enterprise.

A mobility platform should provide data synchronisation and access via secure channels, such as HTTPS or VPN. Multi-factor authentication of the user and the device, such as using unique identification built in to the device or network SIM (subscriber identification module) cards, or network features such as caller-id.

From an application design point only required data needs to be kept on the mobile device and other data can be purged.

Server

Mobile applications require an application gateway to communicate with that ensures back-office application services are always available. This in turn requires that the gateway itself be running on a stable and scalable Operating System and Application Server. This must also integrate into the enterprise network architecture for authenticating users and accessing back-office data. It should be capable of transactional growth as demand increases for mobile access to data and back-office services. Application platforms based on scalable architectures and industry-standards should be used, such as the J2EE or .NET architectures. These architectures can deliver enterprise or carrier based performance and reliability.

Management of the mobility platform server should allow multiple and custom administration roles to allow for delegated tasks within the I.T. team. Remote access to the server, via web, provides easy access to the system without additional client installation.

Solution delivery options

With the growth of internet e-mail there has been growing acceptance to the benefits of out-sourcing data systems for high availability and remote access to the systems without dependence on other corporate infrastructure. This is also the case with Wireless Application Gateway’s, and the operational requirements and costs provide for the following licensing models:

• Application Service Provider (ASP) – limits capital expenditure, system maintenance, etc. (ideal for non-IT based companies). Does not grow assets and is not an investment decision but rather operational expensed.
• Managed Service – Similar to ASP, but requires capital expenditure for hardware by the company but out-source the management & monitoring.
• Software – The most common model of software licensing seen today, which requires capital expenditure for hardware, software licensing and on-going operations are managed in-house.

Both ASP and managed service can provide a cost effective and fast to market capability. The mobility platform and service provider thus offer a flexible solution that can be launched quickly and business benefits can be assessed.

Conclusion

This paper has demonstrated a number of technical areas that should be considered before adding a mobile extension to the corporate network. This information can be used to comprehensively assess the capabilities of commercially available mobile application gateways. The gateway selected for the enterprise must have a history of proven and working solutions coupled with an on going ability to change that future proofs the investment with continually progressing mobile application technologies.

For More Info: www.retriever.com.au

Do mobility systems provide value to logistics companies in the local market?



It has become almost passé to note that the future of competition will be supply chain versus supply chain rather than business versus business. As supply chain competition increases, so does the demand for end-to-end visibility throughout those supply chains. Supply chain visibility systems have become increasingly sophisticated and more and more commonplace but, without Logistics Mobility solutions, they are still subject to blind spots created by people and product on the move. This article will examine the use of mobility in the logistics industry both globally and locally, note technical considerations for mobility implementations, describe a local refrigerated logistics company’s mobility implementation, and close with ten recommendations for those considering Logistics Mobility.

Global mobile penetration

It seems, from our perspective in Australia and New Zealand, that every person in the world has a mobile phone. The Wireless World Forum1 places New Zealand and Australia close to the top of the list of world mobile penetration rates. While some countries in Africa have single-figure adoption rates for mobility subscriptions, most of the world has ‘gone mobile’. Almost a third of the people in the world today have one or more mobile subscriptions. By 2008, it is estimated that that proportion will rise to one-half. New Zealand’s penetration rate of 82% and Australia’s of 86% are bettered only by Singapore, Taiwan, and a handful of countries in Europe. Not even traditional electronic bellwethers such as Hong Kong and South Korea have a higher percentage of people using mobile phones.

What is logistics mobility?

Logistics Mobility may be defined as the application of mobility technologies such as mobile phones and Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs, also known as portable data devices) to the logistics industry for the purposes of improving productivity, efficiency, and customer service. As they are sometimes more a hindrance than a productivity aid, uses such as voice communications, SMS and email are excluded.

Logistics Mobility adoption

Logistics Mobility is not new. The earliest sytems date back to 1993, around the time of the production of the first PDAs such as the Apple Newton. Devices were comparatively expensive, unreliable and did not fit in a shirt pocket! Today, Adoption rates of logistics mobility around the world differ wildly, with some countries almost at saturation point and others with nearly to no use of such systems at all. Both Australia and New Zealand are at the lower end of penetration.According to a study by the Aberdeen Group2 mobility technology is considered a key competitive tool by nearly three-quarters of fleet operators in North America. 87% say customer service improvements from mobility have met or exceeded their expectations. It is widely accepted that technology adoption in the supply chain in Australia and New Zealand is many years behind industry best practice in North America and Europe. Surveys then, which point to widespread adoption of particular technologies in these parts of the world, can act as a crystal ball for local supply chain practitioners.

How is Logistics Mobility used?

A survey by eyefortransport3 suggests that the most common usages for wireless applications in logistics are:

1. Track and trace

2. Improving driver communication

3. Route and schedule optimization

4. Proof of delivery and mobile imaging

Return on Investment (ROI) on projects commissioned in these areas was achieved or exceeded for between 81% and 92% of companies. Almost all implementations in Australia and New Zealand have some element of Track and Trace and electronic Proof of Delivery (ePOD). This is necessitated by the mandatory use of the paper Proof of Delivery (POD) document to trigger payment for the provision of logistics services.

The improvements made in driver communication are evident and valuable, but this category of benefit is seen more as a side-effect than a primary project driver.eyefortransport found that the major barriers to implementation were initial and on-going costs, integration of mobile to backend systems, convincing senior management of the business case, and persuading drivers of the benefits.

Few modern logistics companies have large numbers of IT staff and those that do also lumber these precious resources with maintaining PCs, fixing email problems and even looking after the telephones.

It is hardly surprising then, that there is a significant barrier in integration of complex mobility systems to other back-office systems. While other vertical and horizontal industries in Australia and New Zealand such as break and fix field service, merchandising and sales, and express courier services all have widespread adoption of mobility, implementations in general transport and logistics could best be described as sparse.

Low margins and the contractual nature of logistics services contribute to the slow take-up. The paradox is that most contracts also contain continuous improvement clauses, but it is difficult to add a new service into the middle of an existing contract with set margins. Most new contracts, however, contain track and trace and ePOD as a baseline service and so the growth in Logistics Mobility in ANZ is expected to be rapid.

Technical complexitiesThe visible parts of any Logistics Mobility implementation are the mobile devices and the application that runs on them.Though it may surprise the non-technical, the application is actually the simplest part of a mobility system. Almost any programmer can cobble together an application on a PDA. The complexity is considerably more significant in the:

• Networks (GPRS, CDMA, 3G, Satellite, Wi-Fi) and automatic network switching

• Network latency4 in public mobile networks

• Necessity for Occasionally Connected models to allow for patchy mobile coverage

• Peripheral systems to create, schedule, allocate, route and track jobs

• Administration of the system eg. Seeing logged on drivers, audit trails of usage, etc.

• In-field recovery of damaged devices

• In-field update of applications

Logistics service providers should beware the generic software house who throws their hat in the ring to bid for a Logistics Mobility application. They do not know what they do not know.

Mobility Devices

There are 4 main mobility devices to consider.

Smartphones $500-$1,000

Small & light

Cheap

Small screen space

No touch screen

Tablet PC’s $3,000 – $5,000

Large screen

Paper-like

Expensive

Complex forms

Consumer PDA’s $700 – $1,300

Small

Relatively cheap

Breakable

“Desirable”

Rugged PDA’s $1,700 – $3,500

Less breakable

Business-like

Higher initial cost

Lower TCO In addition, there are variousforms of in-vehicle devices and other mobile devices such as the Blackberry5 available, but few of these are used widely for Logistics Mobility in Australia and New Zealand.Smartphones and wireless PDAs6 are both referred to as converged devices. A converged device is one that has both phone and handheld computer functionality. The smartphone is a phone first and a handheld computer second. The PDA is the opposite.While the smartphone is a popular device and becoming more so, its usefulness for logistics is limited because of its small screen real estate and as there is no touch screen. Almost all logistics applications will require the ability to take a signature.The tablet PC is an accomplished device which has established its place well in the wider mobile market. Logistics implementations, however, are rarely complex enough to warrant the investment in the larger screen real­estate. No doubt, the additional expense of the tablet PC also contributes to its low penetration in the logistics market.

Most Logistics Mobility implementations in Australia and New Zealand are on one of the two groups of PDAs: consumer and rugged.The choice largely comes down to priceversus reliability. Although it’s difficult to generalize in this area, operators with smaller fleets or who are new to mobility are more likely to strongly consider consumer devices. Operators with larger fleets or who have previous experience are more likely to ‘go rugged.While there is a common perception that “rugged devices are as prone to breakage as consumer devices”, this is really only true for willful damage: if a driver truly wants to break a device, it doesn’t matter how strong it is. Otherwise, it’s a fallacy.

Logistics Mobility in practice

There are considerable similarities in Logistics Mobility implementations. Most will follow a cycle of six steps.

1. Create: The job (eg. Delivery, pickup, return) to be carried out must be created electronically. The job is often created in an existing backend system such as a Transport Management System (TMS) or Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system.

2. Schedule: While there are wildly differing levels of complexity when it comes to scheduling, this step is primarily to allocate the job to a person, and optionally to schedule when it will occur.

3. Route: As the price of fuel becomes more painful every day, companies are looking to be more intelligent about routing, with an aim to spend less time on the road and travel the shortest possible distance. The Route step is optional.

4. Dispatch: Dispatching concerns the physical action of getting the job to the driver. The job starts in the system in which it was created, is integrated to a Wireless Application Gateway (WAG), and dispatched through the mobile network to a driver’s mobile device.

5. Deliver: This step involves the driver making a delivery or a pickup. The driver will also take a signature and associated details to prove the job was completed.

6. Integrate: Finally, the job status and closure details must be integrated to internal systems such as the TMS, ERP, Track & Trace web site and billing system.The data must also be transmitted to the customer and, optionally, to people who have subscribed to the information.

Case Study – Logistics and Freight Services

Logistics and Freight Services (LAF Services) is a small but rapidly growing refrigerated transport and logistics service provider operating throughout metropolitan Sydney, regional New South Wales and the ACT. Business was flourishing on the word-of-mouth generated from providing a quality and personal service to their customer base, but growth was being hampered by manual paper-based systems. Kyle Williams, NSW Operations Manager at LAF Services, remembers “Our company was constantly knee deep in paper. Daily we would employ several staff simply to sort through returned PODs, check for signatures, and reconcile them against manifests.

This was taking 3 people up to 10 hours a day at the best of times, and over Christmas began to take its toll on myself and my management team. There had to be a better way.” Retriever Communications implemented a mobility solution for LAF Services that integrates the customer’s orders directly, allows them to deconsolidate pickups and consolidate deliveries and runs, pushes dispatch jobs directly to the drivers, gathers status information and ePODs instantly, integrates the information into their accounting system, and sends notifications directly to their customers.

The system has removed paper, enhanced the efficiency of the physical process, removed all transposition errors, and taken days out of the payment cycle for both LAF and their customers. Williams says “With the help of Retriever, we were able to come up with a solution which not only helps our staff do their job effectively, but allows LAF Services to expand without rising administration costs. Using the Retriever System we have been able to provide a highly accurate process to ensure all ePODs are instantly returned to our customers.

This has also allowed LAF Services to manage our staff into other areas of our business, and provide a far greater focus on customer service.”

He adds “Our customers, such as The King Island Group and Manassen Foods Australia are able to track and trace their daily orders and gain access to our delivery performance. This has seen a much happier and stronger relationship form between us and our customers. We now have new contracts lined up and we won’t have to worry about the mountains of paperwork that used to be associated with a new contract. Instead we can focus on better service. “

Recommendations

With many years’ experience of implementing Logistics Mobility solutions, we offer the following ten recommendations:

1. Use a specialist mobile solutions provider. Don’t get fooled into engaging a non-specialist software writer.

2. Review the total cost of ownership of hardware and at least consider the rugged device.

3. Consider an outsourced or ASP7 solution to avoid complexity and support headaches.

4. Simple is best. Keep the application simple to make training easier and avoid mistakes.

5. Keep the first project manageable. Focus on paper-heavy tasks and quick ROI.

6. Don’t go online. Mobile coverage can be patchy so opt for an occasionally connected model with a thick client that will allow your drivers to do their jobs even when they don’t have coverage.

7. Put something in for the driver. To achieve greater driver acceptance, include something in the application which makes the life of the driver easier eg. Time sheets.

8. Allow time for design. The design phase of a project is the most underestimated. It is usually more difficult to agree the requirement than to build the final application.

9. Don’t allow integration to be shrugged off. Data is useless if it can’t be integrated to internal systems and external customers. Make sure that the solution provider understands how to integrate to your systems.

10. Appoint “tech-savvy” power users to learn the system first, train their peers, and be the first port-of-call for support.

Conclusion

Mobility solutions are not yet widely used in the local market. However, early -adopter implementations in Australia and New Zealand show that local logistics companies can achieve productivity gains and improvements in order-to-cash cycles and customer service that match those of their global counterparts.

About Retriever Communications Retriever Communications has been a world-leader in the provision of Logistics Mobility and wireless field­force automation systems for over 10 years. Headquartered in Sydney Australia, Retriever Communications delivers software and ASP-based mobile services to customers worldwide both direct and through a partner network.

About Walker Datavision

Walker Datavision is a leading provider of data capture solutions in New Zealand. In business for 44 years, Walker Datavision offers complete solutions in the fields of software integration, barcoding, RFID, wireless communication, and handheld computers. Walker Datavision is the sole distributor in New Zealand for Retriever Communications products and services.

About the author Drew Seitam is Director, Operations for Retriever Communications and a member of the Executive Committee of the Logistics Association of Australia. T +61 2 9006 8600 W http://www.retriever.com.au/

1 Source: Wireless World Forum, [http://www.w2forum.com/] 2 Source: Aberdeen Group, Inc. 3 Source: The Use of Wireless and Mobile Technology in Fleet Operations 2005 – eyefortransport, November 2005, http://www.eyefortransport.com/ 4 The time it takes for a packet of data to get from one point in a network to another. 5 Blackberry is developed by Research In Motion Limited (RIM). 6 PDAs are available with and without radios. To enable a Logistics Mobility Application, the device must have a radio. The most common network type used in Australia is GPRS. 7 An Application Service Provision (ASP) solution is one in which the server software, hardware, communications, network connections and support are all outsourced to an external company, dramatically reducing up-front costs.