Take the case of SAP, the German enterprise software developer, and its MySAP Mobile Workplace. SAP, maker of the popular R/3 ERP suite, started hawking a wireless enterprise portal product early this year. The big selling point of Mobile Workplace is that it can be customized for different departments. A salesperson's portal, for example, might allow access to a T&E billing application, email, customer and product data, and pertinent public Web pages. But that employee wouldn't be allowed to root around in corporate financial records or HR files.
Before putting the product on the market, however, the company rolled out the program for the benefit of the 320 sales executives at its SAP America division. It was an eye-opener. ''The first thing that slapped us rudely across the face was bandwidth,'' says Tom DelMonte, manager of internal business consulting for the customer relationship management team at SAP America. ''When you're working on a traditional network, that's not a consideration. But when you go to a wireless environment, it's a big consideration.''
To skirt the problem, SAP designed MySAP Mobile Workplace to automatically determine what wireless appliance a worker is using. The software then tailors the output for that appliance. A worker using a handheld device with a small screen, for instance, receives data in a simpler format than an employee who views the data on a notebook display.
But bandwidth wasn't the only snag. DelMonte says executives at SAP America discovered that no wireless phone carrier offers true nationwide service. SAP America's sales executives access their mobile portals using Compaq iPAQ handheld computers. Those devices run over CDPD (cellular digital packet data) networks — the sort operated by AT&T Wireless and Verizon. Neither of the two carriers offers full coast-to-coast CDPD coverage in the United States, however. ''If you went with just one vendor,'' recalls DelMonte, ''you only had certain coverage areas included in your basic price, and as you roamed out of those areas, prices skyrocketed. The charges were just astronomical.''
So, project managers at SAP America decided to give sales executives access to the vendor whose coverage area most closely matched their own sales territory. ''Our costs were in the hundreds of thousands of dollars per month if we allowed roaming,'' says DelMonte. ''With this scenario, we're spending about $25,000 to $40,000 a month.'' Even so, DelMonte concedes that 15 to 20 percent of the work done by the company's sales force occurs in areas where there is simply no wireless service available.
Given these obstacles, it's not surprising that m- commerce rollouts often run overbudget and long. To avoid project hell, experts say it's vital to avoid overkill. Tony Esposito, vice president of sales at wireless platform provider Broadbeam, notes that executives often put together a wish list with every feature they could want in an application — including wireless capabilities. ''Then they try to find somebody to give them everything on that wish list,'' he says. ''They spend years putting it all together, only to come out with nothing because they find out it just isn't possible yet.''
Until 3G technology arrives, it's best to start small. ''People who have seen instant payback on their investment,'' says Esposito, ''are those who took a very good idea and concept, implemented the core piece, and then built off it as they went along.''
Reader Comments» Post a comment