“Sarbanes-Oxley requires companies to accurately show that they really own the assets they say they do, and that equipment holding financial data is controlled and secured. Similarly, businesses covered under the Health Information Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) also have to keep IT assets under tight control.”
“The consortium, made up of leading North American-based financial institutions, tech vendors, independent research organizations and government agencies, has been working to develop standards for RFID-based IT asset tracking systems, including pre-tagging of equipment at the manufacturer.” Read the full story.
Andrea says: Recent research indicates that there are expected to be some dramatic improvements in HF RFID technology ultimately leading to 90% reduction in tag cost, new signalling techniques that improve many parameters, elimination of inlays and many other advances. This will make it a much stronger contender in supply chains and asset management.
With such a cost reduction in the tags then RFID becomes much more accessible for many applications and there will be a natural drift to replace printed bar codes with contact less technology. However, bar codes will be around for a long time to come serving our disposability and commodity based markets.
Price has always been a determining factor in mobile field service installations, but that concern with dollars has expanded to include total cost of ownership and labour efficiency.
“When it is time to tighten belts, there is always increased scrutiny on the cost of an IT installation. However, mobile computing vendors say that more companies are looking at the initial cost, the total cost, and how a mobile solution may improve efficiency within the walls of their businesses as well as in the field when they choose a field service or other mobility solution.”
“When I talked with two vendors in the mobility space - Panasonic Computer Solutions Company, which specializes in rugged wireless computers, and Zebra Technologies, a software and hardware mobile products provider - they both identified plenty of sales opportunities for VARs willing to hone their value and total cost of ownership (TCO) propositions.” Read the full story.
Andrea says: Without doubt businesses are focusing on TCO and ROI more than every before. It is now really important that the VAR puts together the facts and figures to present the business case to the customer. Two of our recent mobile solution deals have been based solely on the speed of ROI, and so far the gains have been seen more quickly than originally estimated.
The efficiencies gained by moving to a mobile solution from a desk-based, paper driven and manual system cannot be under-estimated. Sometimes change is difficult to implement and can have catastrophic effects if not managed correctly. Some handholding after the decision has been made is essential to give the customer confidence in the technology and in the company they have partnered with. Illustrating TCO and ROI can be relatively easy, but demonstrating it can be more difficult if you choose the wrong partner.
Global IT spending to drop as telecoms and services fade
“Worldwide IT spending is set to fall by 6% this year as the dual problems of recession and exchange rates continue to impact the market. Analyst firm Gartner, has revised its predictions of an overall decline of 3.8% from the first quarter upwards, as tough conditions continue to eat into spending.”
“A drop of 6% means total worldwide spending on IT will drop to $3.2 trillion from $3.4 trillion in 2008. Although many economists believe the recession has entered a levelling off period before the recovery starts problems with confidence persist and are undermining the willingness of customers to spend.” Read the full story.
Andrea says: As a specialist IT hardware distributor we have seen margins drop significantly over the past 12-24 months. Total spend has remained relatively flat, but mobile computing devices continue to forge ahead and thus keep the overall numbers up.
Mobile broadband growth drives mobile video adoption
“High-speed mobile broadband networks, capable devices and flat rate data plans are driving market growth of media rich mobile applications such as mobile video according to new research from Frost and Sullivan (F&S).”
“Analysing the state of the US mobile broadband industry, F&S says that although streaming video content has been delivered to mobile devices in the US for nearly five years, the penetration of video enabled mobile phones in North America is now ’significant’. It says that with recent improvements in mobile broadband networks, devices, content creation, delivery and protection frameworks, mobile video services are set to become immensely popular channels for information on the go, applications that could well likely see use in mobile business.” Read the full story.
Andrea says: Mobile applications are in development all the time - there have been breakthroughs recently in mobile projector technologies and applications. Pico-projector products and projector components are now to be found in mobile phones hitting the US market.
Two manufacturers have launched mobile phone sized devices with two hour battery life, and another manufacturer expects to be providing embedded projector components for mobile phones in Korea and Europe later this year. Mobile computing devices are fast becoming the must-have for consumer and businesses alike allowing the dividing line between work and pleasure to become ever more faint.
Posted by andrea 30th July 2009 at 10:41am
