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As we conclude our series of excerpts from the exceptional industry guide 'Mobile Resource Management for Dummies', which has been commissioned by Verizon Connect we bring you ten benefits Mobile Resource Management (MRM) can bring to your business.

Is Mobile Resource Management a key Topic for you?! Dive straight into the full eBook by hitting the button below!    

 

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If you have missed any of the other excerpts within this series you can catch up on the other topics we've explored which include: Understanding Digital Transformation in a Connected, Mobile World  also Thinking Outside the Silo and Harnessing the Power of Telematics,  Realising the Value of Mobile Resource Management and Avoiding Mobile Resource Management Pitfalls and Driving Employee Engagement with Gamification

However, the eBook contains a wealth of other key chapters offering important insight for any field service professional and we advise downloading the full eBook on either of the links at the top and bottom of the page...

 

Cloud-based MRM solutions can help your business to achieve numerous benefits: lower fuel costs, improved driver safety, better fleet utilisation, increased worker productivity, proactive maintenance and enhanced customer experience to name a few.

But the benefits to other areas of a company may not be as obvious. A comprehensive MRM solution can deliver benefits to many departments and roles within a company, including increasing return on investment (ROI) and lowering the total cost of ownership (TCO) of mobile assets, improving productivity, increasing business agility and achieving competitive advantage.

By connecting vehicles, mobile assets, people and work, MRM gives the organisation the insight, agility and customer experience to stop lagging behind competitors and lead the market – to not just succeed but thrive.

In this way, MRM can transform the way the organisation does business.

So let's explore a few of the benefits experienced across various areas within the organisation.

 

#1 Operations:

An MRM solution provides operations managers with the tools they need to be able to plan for the day, week, month and year ahead. It gives complete visibility into everything that’s on-the-go so that teams can help to control running costs, streamline operations, optimise current assets and staff, make the most of the customer experience, and ensure compliance with all safety standards and regulatory mandates. It provides the data to help to plan for the future as companies look to grow and advance.

You need a broad platform approach to help automate manual processes, ensure consistency and efficiency throughout all operations and know that it’s all working. You need to be responsive and agile to customer demands. A negative customer experience damages you, your operation and the company as a whole. Organisations all live and die on the efficiency of the operation, and you need to introduce new services quickly and cost-effectively to meet the fast-changing expectations of customers.

 

#2 Fleet Management:

MRM programs can keep fleets in the best shape possible by reducing management and maintenance costs, creating proactive maintenance alerts, and opening a direct connection to maintenance providers. An MRM solution can also help to optimise the way the organisation uses its fleet, with planning tools that help to ensure that the right number and type of mobile resources are assigned to the right jobs, people and vehicles.

 

#3 Information Technology:

Through the use of an MRM solution, IT can access the data it needs to support the optimisation and automation of work and cash flows across the organisation. A cloud-based MRM solution also means fewer systems for IT to maintain, easier integration without the need to create and maintain application programming interfaces (APIs), faster deployment in the cloud, and simpler management of a single platform.

An MRM solution allows the team to enable and secure the collection of operational data from vehicles and drivers, and integrate that data with other applications for complete operations visibility.

 

#4 Making Safety a Priority:

An MRM solution can help businesses to make safety a priority by monitoring mobile resources such as construction tools, cherry pickers, cranes, and other heavy equipment to ensure that they’re being properly operated and maintained.

An MRM solution can also help management to create safer driving behaviours, such as avoiding speeding and harsh braking, through the use of driver scorecards and coaching tools, monitoring seatbelt usage, and providing accident notifications with airbag deployment alerts, along with in-cab alerts and live reporting. It can also help the team to reduce the possibility of accidents by optimising drivers’ routes and cutting out unnecessary travel. Finally, an MRM solution can help drivers with regulatory compliance.

 

#5 Risk Management:

With MRM, risk management teams have the ability to ensure regulatory and policy compliance in vehicles and demonstrate a mobile duty of care.

By identifying unsafe driving behaviour, providing insights into accident or damage claims, mitigating fleet liability risks, and protecting against potential fraud, theft and supervisory negligence claims, businesses can reduce risk due to consequential losses.

In other words, MRM software is the eyes and ears to ensure the on-the-go organisation is running as smoothly as possible, and provides peace of mind for business owners and directors, as MRM insights allow for greater control and measurement of key compliance and safety legislation.

#6 Sales and Customer Relations:

An MRM solution helps to give sales and customer relations one of the very best outcomes possible – more on-time service calls, deliveries and appointments, and better customer estimated time of arrival (ETA) visibility. That, in turn, creates long-term fans and brand advocates who’ll come back again and again.

 

#7 Human Resources:

Human resources can use an enterprise fleet management solution to gain a near real-time connection to all on-the-go employees. Whether it’s visibility, near real-time coaching, training or helping drivers to hit more of their targets by being more efficient, an MRM software solution gives human resources the tools they need to make employees even better.

 

#8 Tax Recordkeeping:

An MRM solution includes driver apps, simplifying the classification of business and personal journeys. This helps to reduce administration time and produces mileage reporting in an HMRC- ready format. MRM solutions can also control routes, helping to avoid road tolls.

 

#9 Payroll:

By making aspects like miles and hours driven, hours on site, and time from clock-in to departure easy to measure, and by moving from paper to electronic timesheets, an MRM solution helps payroll to perform more efficiently.

MRM helps you to better manage wage bills by matching the right skill to the right job, rather than sending overqualified staff to easier, low-level jobs. An MRM solution can also help you to manage labour distribution efficiently so that you can assign jobs to less utilised employees earning standard time, rather than employees earning overtime for a given pay period, when possible. And when payroll is more efficient, salaries and payments go out on time – which makes everybody happy.

 

#10 Finance:

An MRM solution improves cash flow and speeds up billing, by helping the finance department to speed up all payment and processing operations, as well as reduce invoice and settlement disputes. Financial reporting is also faster with easy-to-create and distribute reports that demonstrate savings and productivity throughout the organisation. This is possible because an MRM program can help to automate the entire workflow – moving from paper to digital.

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It seems there has been something of a convergence between the worlds of rugged manufacturers and their consumer peers across the last few years. In the past, the two occupied very separate worlds.

Rugged was very much the world of heavy, chunky, and robust devices, whilst the consumer equivalents were sleeker, more refined and more likely to break if they got dropped.

Today, however, the line has certainly blurred substantially in the middle. Take Xplore’s R12, a fully rugged tablet that smartly converts into a two-in-one powerful enough to be a more than adequate replacement for a desktop let alone a laptop.

Now, whilst the R12 may still look like a heavyweight lining up against a featherweight if put alongside a Microsoft Surface, which would be its most suitable comparison within the consumer realm, it by no means fits the traditional image of a rugged device - i.e. cumbersome, bulky and awkward. It is a sleek looking and excellently engineered device whose lightweight feel belies its robust rugged credentials.

Of course, this is not a one-way street either.

 

"Consumer devices are increasingly likely to have higher certifications that we previously only would have seen in a rugged spec..."

 

Consumer devices are increasingly likely to have higher certifications that we previously only would have seen in a rugged spec sheet.

Take for example Samsungs current flagship smartphone the Note 8.

Not only does have an impressive 6GB RAM on an 1.7GHz octa-core processor making it an exceptionally fast device, but it also has its own Dex docking station that essentially turns it into a mobile desktop by allowing you to plug into a TV or Monitor via HDMI - something that could be hugely useful for the field engineer who needs to give a presentation whilst on the road for example.

Then when we add into the equation that the Note 8 is certified at IP68 (meaning it is essentially impervious to both water and dust ingress) could an argument could be made for it being a strong device for field service use.

We recently hosted a fieldservicenews.com exclusive webcast with rugged specialists Xplore Technologies and the topic of what defines rugged manufacturers against this backdrop of blurring lines was a major talking point within the session.

Our panel consisted of Steve Priestly and Cliff Adams, VP International Sales and Product Marketing for Xplore respectively as well as Bob Ashenbrenner, President of Durable Mobile Technologies.

 

"With the lines beginning to blur between rugged and consumer mobile devices, is there more to why an organisation should choose to work with a rugged manufacturer other than just the specs these days?"

 

The question was put to the panel ‘With the lines beginning to blur between rugged and consumer mobile devices, is there more to why an organisation should choose to work with a rugged manufacturer other than just the specs these days?’

Priestly was the first to respond “I think you raise a very good point in terms of the lines becoming more blurred. At Xplore, where we have more than 20 years worth of experience, we would say that maybe the words are blurred but the principals of building a rugged device are not blurred at all - they a very common.”

“We have built rugged devices from the ground up, with the most rugged of architectures to support all the elements of rugged mobile working.”

 

"I think one of the areas that people get most confused is IP68 - well what does that mean in a rugged environment?"

 

“I think one of the areas that people get most confused is IP68 - well what does that mean in a rugged environment?”

“What is most important in the enterprise environment is for us to be able to demonstrate that we are rugged, we are classified in the industry standard specifications but our product still has all of the appropriate I/O, accessories and capabilities to be able to run the workflow of the mobile worker.”

“That has to be the same across all of our devices and whilst we may share some common specifications with a consumer manufacturer,  but that doesn’t mean they are as rugged as the products we provide”

Ashenbrenner also concurred with Priestly’s sentiments further adding:

“A lot of consumer devices have very little I/O [input/output]and in an enterprise environment having the right amount of I/O  is really, really important,” he explained.

“Now, without I/O it is fairly easy to make an IP68 device - there are very little openings for water or dust to get in. So these consumer manufacturers have sort of stumbled upon an IP68 rating and have thought they that’s one of the things the rugged guys talk about, let’s declare that we’re rugged -well that’s not how it works.”

 

"IP68 is just one feature. It doesn’t cover knocks, it doesn’t cover drops, it doesn’t cover other abuses such as vibrations and such..."

 

“IP68 is just one feature. It doesn’t cover knocks, it doesn’t cover drops, it doesn’t cover other abuses such as vibrations and such. So my advice to field service organisations is don’t be fooled by that one rating they accidentally got when that is only part of the bigger picture.”

“One thing I would just add is that one thing the IP rating doesn’t give you in terms of dealing with a rugged environment is the ability to operate within a wide range of temperatures,” Adams commented.

“If you are going to be operating out direct sunlight or if you are going to operate in a location where there are extremely cold climates, that wide temperature range is something that you will not find on a consumer device. If you need to perform in such conditions then a rugged device has to be the obvious choice there.”

“This is especially true when it comes to tablet devices, where you are running full feature software applications that consume a lot of processing power. A sealed consumer tablet will not have a fan, something which is critical to maintaining the full power of the CPU in those hot environments.”

[quote float="left"]The Xplore range of tablets have internal fans that are isolated from the elements so they can still  have a high IP rating whilst being able to dissipate that heat and maintain that processing power[/quote]“For example, the Xplore range of tablets have internal fans that are isolated from the elements so they can still  have a high IP rating whilst being able to dissipate that heat and maintain that processing power.”

It is of course, these often nuanced details that can get overlooked when we are looking at spec sheets, especially when as is often the case, the purchasing decision is largely driven by either by members of the field service operations team who may not have the deep technical knowledge to be able to fully compare the two devices, or alternatively IT professionals who perhaps do not have the operational experience to fully understand the complexities of the various operating environments the devices will be utilised within.

Another major difference between rugged manufacturers who are serving the enterprise market and more consumer-focused manufacturers is the frequency with which they update their devices - with consumer devices generally going through an upgrade cycle far more regularly than a rugged equivalent.

Whilst, in the consumer world this ongoing arms race between manufacturers to produce devices that can outperform their competitors is one sense advantageous in that it drives continuous innovation and technological advancement, in an enterprise environment such constant change can actually be a negative.

 

"One of the key requirements for a device used by field service engineers is reliability..."

 

One of the key requirements for a device used by field service engineers is reliability - so it is, therefore, essential that the devices a service organisation deploy to the field are stable.

In addition to this in today’s world where security of data is paramount and the threat of cyber attacks something all companies must be vigilant Mobile Device Management (MDM) is a major consideration - something that can become a significant headache for companies that are tied into the faster pace cycle of device and OS upgrades of consumer devices.

So the longer shelf life of rugged devices designed specifically for use within a business environment is another major plus in their favour - but even then there must be a balance between stability and ensuring the tools you provide your field engineers with are sufficiently up to date to deal with the demands of the software they are using.

This leads us to a critical question - just how long should we wait before we roll out new devices to our field workers? And how should a field service organisation assess the decision of whether it is time for them to invest in new devices for their field engineers?

Most companies when they are deploying tablets and begin a project they think about a three-year time frame,” Ashenbrenner states.

 

"Three years is a good time frame to roll to new technologies and have an R.O.I (return on investment). However, the real issue is 'does it still do the job?'"

 

“That is because three years is a good time frame to roll to new technologies and have an R.O.I (return on investment). However, the real issue is 'does it still do the job?' and most of that comes down to software.”

“If the original device has enough processing power and memory to handle the software you are using - especially the updates that are pretty frequent, and also when new capabilities are being added that is when you tend to see people saying ‘hey this is still working, I can upgrade my software’ and this is when you can see the longer uses in the field - sometimes five years, sometimes even seven years,” he adds.

Adding a slightly different take on the question Priestly commented:

“To my mind, there are a few different things that come into the equation. Firstly, there is a financial discussion which says how long will the equipment be depreciated within the companies financial statements - and typically three years is a good answer to that. It fits well with other technologies and it allows them to look at it in a common way”

“But that doesn’t describe how it is used in the field. The challenge that Xplore faces is that things will dictate outside of this what the life cycle of the device is. It could be something as simple as data security that causes a change in equipment to drive an additional set of features.”

“Or alternatively it could be that everything is fine after the three years and they are getting free use from the devices for as long as they need to.”

 

"One of the things that Xplore would point to is that is in our longest running platform we reiterated the device to stay on top of the processing and memory requirements of the device and were able to do that for seventeen years..."

 

“One of the things that Xplore would point to is that is in our longest running platform we reiterated the device to stay on top of the processing and memory requirements of the device and were able to do that for seventeen years.”

“That is seventeen years within a single eco-system that an enterprise could get around. Yes, the device changed over time, but it remained the same form factor and enabled an enterprise to be stable within its use.”

“Whether that enterprise is a government facility, military would be a good example or perhaps a pharmaceutical clean room environment where the absolute top end of the specification is required - that is the type of thing that Xplore looks to - being on top of the changes in terms of the technical and customer requirement, whilst being able to provide stability for a long period of time both in our service and in our product capabilities.”

“That is a great point and something that must be considered,” Adams adds.

“Especially when we see consumer devices that come out that each have a slightly different form factor because they are really going for those aesthetic changes. A rugged device is really tailor-made for enterprise environments.”

 

"A rugged device is really tailor-made for enterprise environments..."

 

“Change isn’t necessarily good in such environments, stability is something can enable companies to keep costs lower and devices deployed longer and at Xplore, we understand that so we build our chassis so they can be upgraded over the years but still maintain common accessory eco-system over those generational upgrades.”

This is, of course, another hugely important consideration that is often overlooked within discussion around device selection for field service organisations - the range of accessories available. Most rugged manufacturers provide accessories such as vehicle mounts that are designed specifically to fit their devices and to ensure that issues like vibration don’t impact upon the device.

By maintaining the same form factor and chassis, rugged manufacturers such as Xplore are able to help their clients avoid the additional costs of new accessories each time they invest in new devices - something that can stack up to quite a considerable additional cost if you have a large field workforce.

Something that we’ve discussed a number of times in Field Service News that was also reflected within the webcast was that companies must have an understanding of the workflow of their engineers and then select their devices accordingly.

However, for many organisations there will be varying different roles being carried out within the field so how should field service organisations decide just how many different devices and form factors they should deploy to find a balance between equipping their varying types of field workers with devices suitable for their requirements and having to types of devices deployed - which again can cause problems when it comes to MDM?

 

"It is important to have the right device for the person and for the right workflow..."

 

“It is important to have the right device for the person and for the right workflow,” comments Adams.

“At Xplore, we offer an array of device form factors, but also within those form factors, we have an array of different computing options. So you could get an entry-level CPU if that works for the user and they don’t need a top of the line processor we can offer that, but then we also offer within the same form factor high performance options or even different I/O options - so there is a way an organisation can still manager a smaller number of devices and still provide a choice to the user so they are putting the right device in front of the right worker at the right time.”

“To add to that one of the things that should also be considered is the definition of the software to support the workflow you are trying to automate in the hands of the worker,” Priestly adds.

“That will dictate the type of data that needs to be input, the type of data that needs to be viewed and the type of data that any business information is driven from often dictates the type of device that will need to be used.”

“If there is a lot of form filling or repetitive tasks such as barcode scanning a handheld fits that bill very well. Then as you move between that and a larger device such as our twelve-inch tablet very much that is dictated to by the workflow itself.”

“Let me add a few real-life examples,” added Ashenbrenner as the discussion drew to a close.

“In utilities, you will tend to see all of the repair workers will use one type of device but meter workers and meter repair is a whole different area and so you will likely see handhelds being used in that situation.”

 

"Where beat officers on the front line might be using a tablet, detectives in the same police department tend to gravitate towards two-in-ones..."

 

“Another example might be in law enforcement, where beat officers on the front line might be using a tablet, detectives in the same police department tend to gravitate towards two-in-ones.”

Indeed, Ashenbrenner’s final point in the discussion is an important one that highlights just how many variables must be considered when selecting the right devices for your field workforce.

However, one thing that remains clear is that whilst on the surface it may appear that the lines between rugged and consumer devices are blurring, the reality is that for companies seeking to maximise their R.O.I from the mobile devices they use, there are far deeper considerations than headline tech specs - and this is where working with dedicated manufacturers such as Xplore can truly bring additional value to the table via their understanding and insight of how organisations will be utilising the devices in the field, how to extend the life of those devices where possible and of course how to roll out new devices whilst avoiding significant disruption to day-to-day field service operations.

The ball for the time being then remains firmly in the rugged court.

 

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Enterprise mobility company Kony Inc. has launched a mobile solution with SAP-Certified Integration to help companies modernise their field service processes for mobile devices, IoT and wearables.

The Kony Mobile Field Service solution for SAP Business Suite is a set of three new apps and implementation services designed to help businesses move away from a paper-based field service operation to a completely mobilised environment within 30 days.

“We are seeing more organisations turn to mobility to streamline processes and increase productivity; however, many are still held back by expensive upgrades and limited resources,” said Dave Shirk, president, Product, Strategy and Marketing for Kony. “With Kony Mobile Field Service solution, enterprises using SAP Business Suite can now quickly mobilise the field team without investing in expensive upgrades to their SAP systems, or having to rip and replace their entire backend infrastructure. With mobility, they can now process more work orders, improve their service levels and first time fix rates; and ultimately increase revenue by introducing the ability for technicians to upsell and process payments in the field.”

The solution is a single integrated suite that optimises the entire field service business process. This enables businesses to maximise efficiency while processing notification, planning and tracking, and executing work orders all in a single integrated app suite.  It is built on the Kony Mobile Platform, and extensive experience and expertise based on helping global companies and brands mobilise their field service business processes.

One of the first users to deploy the solution is Irish utility company ESB.  "Servicing more than two million customers, we needed a mobile solution that our field technicians could rely on to help streamline work orders and improve overall efficiency,” said Eugene O’Sullivan, Networks Mobile programme manager, ESB. “We turned to Kony to help mobilise our field services because data is very important in our industry and Kony’s solutions offered the data synchronisation we needed. With our Mobile Work Order solution, technicians have the ability to view work order details, see location maps, review meter details, and record data to complete the work orders.”

Kony is a silver partner in the SAP PartnerEdge program and provides enterprises using SAP systems the flexibility and agility they need to use these apps as is or they can customise the front-end application design and integrations with their back-end systems to fit their requirements. In addition to SAP, Kony can also mobilise other enterprise applications such as Oracle, Microsoft, Siebel, and Salesforce to drive process improvements.

 

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In the latest version of its Glass wearable technology, Google is aiming squarely at the enterprise market, say reports from the US.

Reports in the US Wall Street Journal that Google has developed a new version of its Google Glass wearable technology has got the newswires humming, not least because it is said to be firmly targeted at the enterprise sector not the consumer market as was the case with the now discontinued first version.

Google is reported to be distributing Glass 2 to software partners to enable them to develop programs that will use Glass 2 for enterprise tasks in sectors that include manufacturing, health and energy,

The Glass 2 design is said to include a longer, thinner cubeless prism to improve the display and a different frame that opens up the possibility of the technology being used with regular spectacles. The WSJ says the latest version has  a faster Intel processor and boasts improved battery life and better wireless internet connectivity.

By focusing on enterprise private workplaces rather than consumers, Google seems to be attempting to allay fears, widely aired in the US,  over privacy,  stemming from the fact that the public would not know whether they were being filmed. Other concerns include the potential cyber threat to enterprise.

FSN view

[quote float="left"]Whether Google Glass 2 does become a valuable enterprise tool  might depend on finding the right context.

 

 

Whether Google Glass 2 does become a valuable enterprise tool remains to be seen. Reaction to the Google Glass technology has been mixed and might depend on finding the right context. Airline Virgin Atlantic, for example, has trialled it for Upper Class passengers and has reported positive response from both passengers and staff. We discussed the benefits smart glasses might have in the field service sector in Part 2 of our recent series The 2020 Field Engineers Toolkit. 

What is true, however, is that technology that was once way out there in the realms of science fiction is now becoming a reality.  It's easy to forget that smartphones and tablets began as consumer devices but were  quickly harnessed for enterprise, or that security concerns over earlier versions of Google's Android OS meant it was once deemed "unfit-for-enterprise".

Google and its developers have worked to address those fears, so there's no reason to doubt they will do the same for solutions that use Glass 2 for data capture.

 

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Welcome to the latest edition of the Field Service News podcast. This month Field Service News Editor Kris Oldland and Paul Sparkes of Advanced Field Service discuss the findings of the latest Field Service News research which assessed the mobility tools being used by field service companies today.

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Two market leaders partner to offer a comprehensive DevOps solution for building     enterprise-class mobile applications and ensuring peak performance

Kony, Inc., a leading enterprise mobility company and SOASTA, a leader in performance analytics, have recently announced a partnership that combines both companies’ capabilities to optimise the performance of enterprise mobile apps across the mobile application development lifecycle.

Through this partnership, Kony and SOASTA will work together to integrate their technologies and combine their expertise to deliver a comprehensive, integrated mobile solution across the DevOps lifecycle for customers. As a result, from prototype to production, mobile apps built on the Kony Mobility Platform can be tested, monitored, measured, analysed and optimised for peak performance with SOASTA’s TouchTest,CloudTestand mPulse solutions for an integrated Mobile DevOps solution.

According to industry analyst firm Gartner, “The need for automation in mobile application testing is high, and is being driven by agile development practices and a desire to drive quality and features based on user analytics. This pace, combined with a broad and changing device ecosystem, creates a test explosion that without automation will end up crushing all but the most trivial application efforts.” (Gartner, Market Guide for Mobile Application Testing, 3 December 2014)

The Kony Mobility Platform is an open and standards-based, integrated platform that supports the entire application software development lifecycle (SDLC), and empowers enterprises to quickly design, build, deploy and manage multi-edge app experiences. The combined Kony and SOASTA offering delivers an expanded, comprehensive new generation mobile DevOps lifecycle support, including design prototyping, rapid development, functional test automation, back-end integration, deployment, user monitoring and advanced mobile real-time analytics. No other vendor is offering this kind of comprehensive solution. This underscores SOASTA and Kony’s commitment to providing the highest level of mobile developer support, helping enterprise companies align business and IT, while also keeping the rapidly growing mobile user population productive on their systems.

DevOps is a software development method that stresses communication, collaboration, integration, automation and measurement of cooperation between software developers and other information-technology (IT) professionals. DevOps acknowledges the interdependence of software development, quality assurance and IT operations and aims to help an organisation rapidly produce software products and services and to improve operations performance.

“In the rapidly growing world of mobile, user experience and application performance are fundamental to enterprise mobile application adoption and success,” said Thomas E. Hogan, CEO, Kony, Inc. “By adding performance analytics and testing solutions to our market-leading enterprise mobility platform, we will empower developers and DevOps teams with the best platform for creating mobile applications at any scale, with the best performance and experience.”

With the integration of Kony and SOASTA, the following new capabilities will be offered to customers:

• Mobile test automation eliminates manual testing delays and accelerates time-to-market, with the SOASTA TouchTest offering
• Continuous performance testing at speed and scale through SOASTA’s patented CloudTest federates millions of cloud-based servers from every major cloud provider
• Access to hundreds of real mobile devices through the cloud for testing at every phase of mobile development, with SOASTA Mobile Device Cloud
• Real User Monitoring (RUM) validates each user experience in real time and correlate real user activity to business metrics through performance analytics, with SOASTA mPulse

“Enterprise mobile application developers will hugely benefit from the partnership between SOASTA and Kony, with the best end-to-end solution to create apps that will perform at the most optimal level,” said Tom Lounibos, CEO, SOASTA. “SOASTA customers are committed to providing the highest level of user experience. Now, Kony customers can also rely on the same market-leading performance analytics to optimise their mobile and Web platforms.

Key benefits of the new end-to-end DevOps platform:

• Continuous test integration and agile delivery enables the business to respond to market and competitive change
• Reuse code and backend APIs across apps, digital channels and form factors
• Leverage the cloud to instantly build, provision, test and scale mobile apps and infrastructure
• Keep up with the rapid pace of new devices, versions, OSs and form factors as they are released
• Use powerful analytics to drive insights, iteration and perfect the UX/UI
• Accelerate performance by analysing all the real user data in real time in a single pane for quick and accurate insights
• Create visually rich, device-exploiting apps in record time using collaborative WYSIWYM (“what you see is what you get”) design tools
• Guarantee compatibility across a constantly changing device landscape with unmatched 30-day service level agreement (SLA) on new OS updates
• Ensure a mobile app scales in line with the growth of your customers and business
• Define smart, context-aware policies to secure your enterprise apps and ensure data integrity and availability
• Reuse, Integrate and extend high-value LOB processes to mobile users with powerful backend mobile infrastructure
• Ability to automate functional test cases against a variety of devices and form factors
• Significantly reduce quality assurance cycles
• Create proactive testing plans letting enterprises know of problems before their customers do

SOASTA has been recognised by Gartner as a “Leader” in its Magic Quadrant forIntegrated  Software Quality Suites report published August 28, 2014.

For two years in a row industry analyst firm Gartner placed Kony in the “Leaders” quadrant of the Magic Quadrant for Mobile Application Development Platforms, published September 2, 2014. Kony also received the highest scores in 3 out of 4 use cases in Gartner’s Critical Capabilities for Mobile Application Development Platforms report published December 24, 2014. In addition, Kony was recognised as “One of the Best Platform Solutions for the Enterprise” amongst Mobile Application Development Platform providers: Ovum Decision Matrix: Selecting a Mobile App Development Platform Solution, 2015-16.

 

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Kony, Inc. a leading enterprise mobility company, recently announced that it has been named as a “Leader” and recognised as one of the best platform offerings for the enterprise, and most comprehensive cloud-based mobile solution on the market in the Ovum Decision Matrix: Selecting a Mobile App Development Platform (MADP) Solution, 2015-16 report.

Kony was also highlighted as one of the most widely deployed application development platforms, with a broad range of both mission-critical enterprise and consumer-facing scenarios. As the largest pure-play provider focused on enterprise mobility solutions, Kony serves more than 20 million mobile app users worldwide and manages more than a billion user sessions annually.

“Mobile will be the ante to the game of commerce, productivity and loyalty,” said Thomas E. Hogan, chief executive officer, Kony, Inc. “As mobile is fast becoming a major catalyst for business innovation and process transformation for the enterprise, I believe companies will either lead with mobile or be left behind. The recognition of Kony as an industry leader by Ovum is a testament to the relentless focus and commitment by our Kony team to help our customers take full advantage of the power of mobile to advance their business agenda.”

According to the Ovum report, “Smart mobile devices are proving to be the preferred choice when connecting to the Internet, not only for consumers, but also now for enterprise workers.”

 

The report also states that many enterprises are prioritising mobile apps over all other app development requirements, for both external (business and consumer-facing) and internal requirements. Furthermore, enterprises today must have a mobile app strategy, driven by consumers choosing to do more with their mobile devices over traditional computers.

Ovum recognised Kony for developing a leading business to address the needs of enterprises as they turn to app development solutions that offer a build-once, deploy to many device operating systems and form factors.

The Kony Mobility Platform is an end-to-end mobile app development platform that offers full lifecycle support on-premise or on the cloud. In the Key Findings section of the report, Ovum states “The advantage of a wide-scope MADP solutions in one box is that developers have a one-stop solution, reducing tool overheads and integration issues, facilitating traceability of work assets.”

 

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Red Hat  a leading provider of open source solutions, today announced its vision to help organisations succeed in the mobile-first economy. Customers can take advantage of Red Hat’s experience and leadership in enterprise IT, and its portfolio of enterprise-grade open source technologies – including mobile capabilities from the recent acquisition of FeedHenry – to overcome their mobility challenges.

Mobility is increasingly becoming a top priority for business as a means to drive innovation and streamline operational efficiency; however, it is also creating demand for faster and continuous development cycles that challenge traditional IT infrastructure and development methodologies. To become mobile-centric, enterprises must evolve in a way that supports both the agility of new mobile initiatives and stability of core IT.

In response, Red Hat is focusing its enterprise mobility vision on four areas: platform architecture, developer experience, technology integration, and collaboration in two-track IT environments.

• Platform architecture: The public cloud or private Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS)-based architecture of the Red Hat mobile platform facilitates agile development and DevOps processes, leverages RESTful APIs and microservices, and accelerates time-to-deployment to reduce total cost of ownership (TCO).
• Developer experience: A developer-centric approach that embraces modern toolchains, collaboration, and continuous development and integration allows organisations to use existing IT skill-sets for new mobile initiatives.
• Technology integration: Simplified integration of the platform with other enterprise middleware components, based upon a common REST API architecture, captures and stores new data generated by connected devices to help unlock the value in existing systems of record.
• Collaboration in two-track IT environments: Adopting a two-track IT approach, using mobile as the catalyst for building a “fast IT” organisation, helps balance agility with stability and fosters greater collaboration and cooperation between the two tracks.[/unordered_list]

Since accelerating into the enterprise mobile market with the October 2014 acquisition of FeedHenry, a leading mobile enterprise application platform provider, Red Hat has achieved several notable milestones in its mobile journey, including:

•  Release of platform enhancements for mobile Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) and collaboration.
•  Integration of the platform into Red Hat’s award-winning integrated development environment (IDE), JBoss Developer Studio.
• Deployment of FeedHenry technology as a mobile service in OpenShift as part of Red Hat’s xPaaS strategy for cloud-based application development.
• Customers in industries ranging from manufacturing and transportation to workforce management are using Red Hat mobile technologies to reduce costs, increase efficiency, and extend critical enterprise systems to mobile devices.
• Recognition of the FeedHenry platform as the top Mobile Backend-as-a-Service (MBaaS) in a sector analysis by GigaOM Research./unordered_list]

Red Hat plans to expand deployment options for the FeedHenry platform and roll out new integrations with the existing Red Hat middleware product portfolio, giving enterprises greater freedom of choice by extending its industry-leading capabilities across hybrid environments.

Commenting on the announcement Craig Muzilla, senior vice president, Application Platforms Business, Red Hat said “The mobile phenomenon has had a profound impact on the way we think and act and consume information in our daily lives.

 

That impact is now rippling throughout enterprise IT as organisations come face-to-face with the reality of doing business in a new ‘mobile first’ world, where speed and agility must be prioritised without forsaking the stability of core IT. Our vision is to help enterprises evolve in a digital world and provide them with an open and flexible architecture and the technologies that accelerate this transition.”

Chris Marsh, principal analyst, Enterprise Mobile App Strategies, 451 Research also commented stating “51% of organisations recently surveyed are further increasing their mobile budgets this year.

The enabling technologies are falling into place for companies to break out of the way they think about mobile from the silos in which it has traditionally resided, but the process needs to evolve to support this.

Over the past year, it has become clearer that traditional waterfall development across the software lifecycle is ill-suited to mobile, and that agile methods are more applicable."

 

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Event Name:Enterprise Mobile Technology 2015
Date: 26 February, 2015
Registration: Click here to register

Overview: Hosted by Panasonic Toughbook & Toughpad the Enterprise Mobile Technology 2015 is a unique one day event bringing together leading executives and key decision makers, partners and suppliers from the mobile services industries.

The event is designed to provide a platform to discuss smarter technologies for a connected mobile workforce. You’ll hear from industry experts, explore new and emerging technologies and also have the opportunity to network with peers and colleagues.

From discussions about the tablet productivity revolution to connectivity in the field and transforming mobile operations, this is a must-attend event.

The day has a full itinerary planned with a number of key speakers including

• Kevin Tristram - General Manager, UK & Ireland Panasonic Computer Product Solutions
• David Rodger, Commercial Lead, Windows Business Group, Microsoft UK
• Lee Johnson - Director, Global Marketing, NetMotion
• Kris Oldland - Editor of Field Service News

With a mix of workshops, presentations and networking including a gala dinner with guest speaker Alan Hansen the day is set top be an excellent opportunity for all field service professionals and those who are responsible for the effective management of a mobile workforce.

 

"With terms such as the 'fourth paradigm', 'industry 4.0' and the 'golden age of information' being readily applied to the early decades of the twenty first century, it is in no doubt that we are currently in the middle of a perfect storm of innovation that is pushing both technology and industry beyond evolution and into revolution."

"Not only is this happening but it is happening faster and faster than ever before. So how will the field engineer of five years time differ from the engineer of today? This is what intend to explore in my presentation at Enterprise Mobile Technology 2015 and it will be great to hear how others at the event see the future also"

The event is being hosted at the Hilton at St George’s Park, Burton Upon Trent which is approximately 30 miles from Birmingham and trains from London St Pancras and Euston both run regular services to either Derby or Lichfield Trent Valley stations respectively which are close enough to get a taxi from. 

A limited number of tickets are still available and registration ends this week.

You can register for the event on this link

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