Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009
This press release from Mobile Enterprise reveals a surprising statistic: 80% of enterprises will overspend on their wireless service costs by an average of 15% through 2014, according to Gartner, Inc. Gartner’s research vice president, Phil Redman, explains the four main areas companies should look to when managing their wireless costs: contracts, international roaming, mobility management and desktop replacement. Read the full article here.
Friday, August 28th, 2009
You’ve decided to invest in a fleet management solution: you’re securing your funding, developing a deployment strategy, and engaging all the right people in your organization to make it happen. It’s come time to make one of the key decisions for the project: you need to choose a wireless network provider.
More often than not, data plan price and wireless coverage will dictate which provider an agency will choose. In some cases, a pre-existing agreement between a provider and your company or municipal institution may mean the decision has already been made for you. However, if you have the ability to research and choose a provider for yourself, then you’ll want to consider the provider’s availability and quality of customer service. Even if you aren’t able to choose for yourself, you’ll want to be informed about the support that will be available to you and your team, not just during the initial stages of your project, but in the long run as well.
Here are some tips that can help you get the most from your wireless network provider’s support services:
• Request a description of the support from the wireless network provider that is included with the wireless services you’re purchasing. This includes contact numbers, hours of operation, cost, and the level or type of support provided.
• If your account rep gives you a “1-800” number for customer support, ask exactly which department the number connects you to. If it is an automated system, ask whether there is a different number available to connect to a call center where you can talk to a live operator, or whether there is a particular keyword or series of menu options for the automated system that you can use to expedite the support process.
• If the devices you’re using to communicate on the wireless network are not cell phones or Blackberry devices, you want to be sure that the person on the other end of the line understands that. When evaluating the major wireless carriers, ask your account rep. if you will have access to a dedicated support department that works with data solutions, not just voice cell phones. That way, you’ll avoid a scenario where you call the support line and the person helping only has knowledge of consumer cell phones and no idea how to support data solutions.
• Ask your account rep if there are different contacts for different kinds of support. For example, you may need to call a certain department to get assistance with activating a new modem, and a different department to get assistance with a deployed modem that you’re having problems with.
• If you are a government agency you will most likely have access to statewide government negotiated pricing so be sure to talk directly to the wireless carrier and request this pricing.
• If you are unsure or uncomfortable with the information you’re receiving from your wireless network provider, review it with your data solutions vendor. They can verify the information and bring clarity.
The key here is to discuss long-term support with a wireless network provider before you make any agreements or put your money down. You understand your needs—now you need to make sure the support you’re paying for meets those needs. Knowing what level of customer service you can expect, and understanding how to access the support you need, will save you time, money, and headaches down the road.
Thursday, August 6th, 2009
GPRS, 1xRTT, iDEN and EDGE are all examples of wireless networks that have revolutionized the way fleet vehicles communicate with dispatch centers. They allow managers to track vehicle position, dispatch trips, update mobile software and retrieve engine diagnostics in real time—all from the comfort of their desk. The collected information is stored in a database for future analysis and reporting with the goal of optimizing fleet operation and streamlining business processes.
Sound too good to be true? It’s not, but this freedom comes at a cost.
To communicate over a wireless network, each mobile device needs a data plan which is supplied by the network provider (Verizon, Sprint, AT&T, etc). These plans are usually billed monthly and allow the mobile device to transmit a certain amount of data over the network. If a device exceeds its data limit, the network provider charges overage fees which are often quite expensive.
Originally, data plan limits were low because there were fewer applications needing wireless data and the messages being sent were small and efficient. Therefore, network providers have historically offered relatively small monthly data limits (e.g. 8MB) for a reasonable price. However, today’s users often exceed their monthly limit and upgrade to a more expensive plan. The recent advent of data-hungry mobile devices such as the iPhone have forced network providers to greatly increase monthly data limits, but they have also introduced the phenomenon of “wasted data”. Wasted data is where wireless applications are no longer designed to make messages as efficient or compressed as they can be because the new wireless plans give the illusion of a bottomless data limit. In reality, huge data plans are often reserved for consumers, while businesses are still faced with smaller limit plans for their devices. To make matters worse, fleet operations must purchase a plan for every device (usually one per vehicle), so costs add up fast.
This is where efficiency and message compression can really save fleet operations money. For example, let’s say a non-optimized wireless application transmits 10MB of real-time information to each device in a 200-vehicle fleet per month. To accommodate this data without overages, a 12MB data plan is selected at a cost of $20 per month. Now assume that an optimized wireless application can transmit the same data in only 6MB per month. The data plans can be downsized to 8MBs at a cost of $15 per month. That saves the fleet over $12,000 a year!
The obvious question is: how can 10MB of data be transmitted in only 6MB? The answer lies in the use of wireless optimization techniques to reduce network usage. These range from simple data compression to intelligent ways of reducing messaging. For example, mobile devices are often configured to send GPS updates every x number of seconds, regardless of speed. To optimize this process, it is much more efficient to send GPS at less frequent intervals when a vehicle is moving slowly or stopped. Techniques like this quickly reduce the amount of data transmitted and save money.
So what lessons can be taken away from this? The importance of choosing a wireless application that optimizes data transmission cannot be underestimated. A well optimized application can save a company thousands of dollars per year in data fees. Freedom from wires comes at a cost, but choosing the right wireless application will ensure that your company is getting the most bang for its buck.
