Kevin Benedict Ponders the Future

M2M Market Overview Part 2 - Consumer Electronics

I just completed a 40 page analyst report on the M2M industry last week. It is a fascinating market, but I am relieved it is finished. Analyst reports are like taking a four week final exam at the university. If you are interested in the M2M (machine-to-machine) or embedded mobile devices market for consumer electronics, you may want to watch this short video that I recorded on the consumer electronics segment of M2M.

I am now working on an executive workshop to help companies understand M2M and the value for remote asset management. Contact me if you would like to discuss!

One of the things I am watching closely these days is to see if enterprise mobility vendors will add M2M data management to their offerings, or whether they will limit their support to smartphones and mobile computers. What makes this interesting is that M2M/embedded mobile devices are sending mobile data to servers that are increasingly useful and valuable to ERPs (see attached image from http://www.m2mexpo.com/). Where will the line be drawn between mobile enterprise applications and data from embedded mobile devices. One is data from a human, and the other is data sent wirelessly from a machine. It will be fun to watch!

For more information related to M2M see the links below:

Article - M2M Market Opportunities - An Introduction
Short Video on M2M- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ob3C5t_6kAQ

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Kevin Benedict, SAP Mentor, SAP Top Contributor, Mobile Industry Analyst
CEO/Principal Consultant, Netcentric Strategies LLC
http://www.netcentric-strategies.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbenedict
http://twitter.com/krbenedict
***Full Disclosure: I am an independent mobility consultant and Web 2.0 marketing expert. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
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Mobile Expert Video Series: SAP VP of EcoHub, Usman Sheikh

Usman Sheikh is VP of SAP's EcoHub, and I had the opportunity at Sapphire this year to interview him about SAP's ecosystem of mobility partners.

What is the SAP EcoHub? EcoHub is a website and a mobile application that accelerates the process of finding the right solution at the right time and provides a new means to address key questions including:

Have I considered all relevant solutions?
Is this applicable to my business?
Are there success stories in my industry?
Is this partner solution certified?
What are my peers saying?

For more interviews in the Mobile Expert Video Series click here.

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Kevin Benedict, SAP Mentor, SAP Top Contributor, Mobile Industry Analyst

CEO/Principal Consultant, Netcentric Strategies LLC

http://www.netcentric-strategies.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbenedict
http://twitter.com/krbenedict
***Full Disclosure: I am an independent mobility consultant and Web 2.0 marketing expert. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
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Mobile Expert Video Series: Syclo's CEO Rich Padula

SAP has many partners in the mobility industry, but only three co-innovation level partners in the enterprise mobility space. They are:

Sybase (SAP announced their intent to acquire Sybase)
RIM (the BlackBerry folks)
Syclo (EAM - mobile enterprise asset management experts)

At Sapphire this year I was able to interview Rich Padula, Syclo's CEO. I asked him to explain the "co-innovation" partnership program with SAP and what it really means.

Syclo's mobile solutions include pre-packaged and pre-integrated applications that mobilize CRM, ERP and EAM systems to improve communications and data capture.

For more interviews in the Mobile Expert Video Series click here.

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Kevin Benedict, SAP Mentor, SAP Top Contributor, Mobile Industry Analyst
CEO/Principal Consultant, Netcentric Strategies LLC
http://www.netcentric-strategies.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbenedict
http://twitter.com/krbenedict
***Full Disclosure: I am an independent mobility consultant and Web 2.0 marketing expert. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
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Mobile Expert Video Series: Vivido Labs' CEO, Greg Tomb

I was the moderator at several enterprise mobility events at Sapphire this year and following one of the sessions I was able to sit down and interview Greg Tomb, the former President of SAP Americas, and now the CEO of an enterprise mobility company called Vivido Labs. In the interview, he makes three very interesting points about mobility:

Mobility is a way of getting more value out of your existing SAP investment by making it available to those in the mobile workforce.
Mobility can enable business process re-engineering by compressing the time of some business processes from days to hours.
Extending SAP mobility into the hands of those not at their desk, can increase productivity for many users.

Vivido Labs describes themselves as leaders in smartphone enterprise mobility with their Mowego mobile platform and their portfolio of mobile enterprise business applications.

For more videos interviews from the Mobile Expert Video Series click here.

Mobile Expert Video Series: SAP's VP of Enterprise Mobility, Prashant Chatterjee

I was lucky enough to be able to sit down with SAP's VP of Enterprise Mobility, Prashant Chatterjee at Sapphire this year and record an interview. In this interview Prashant describes how enterprise mobility is key to SAP reaching 1 billion users by 2014.

For more videos in this Mobile Expert Video series click here.

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Kevin Benedict, SAP Mentor, SAP Top Contributor, Mobile Industry Analyst
CEO/Principal Consultant, Netcentric Strategies LLC
http://www.netcentric-strategies.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbenedict
http://twitter.com/krbenedict
***Full Disclosure: I am an independent mobility consultant and Web 2.0 marketing expert. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
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Best Sources of Information on Enterprise Mobility

Outside of SAP's SDN site, the SAP Enterprise Mobility group on Linkedin has some of the smartest people in the world sharing their thoughts on enterprise mobility. The membership includes the thought leaders from just about all of the big enterprise mobility vendors.

I was reading through some of the discussions today and the comments included in-depth advice from SAP on architecting mobile applications and understanding what mobility platforms are needed in different situations.

If you or anyone in your company is interested in subjects related to enterprise mobility I would encourage you to join. Here is the link.

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Kevin Benedict, SAP Mentor, SAP Top Contributor, Mobile Industry Analyst
CEO/Principal Consultant, Netcentric Strategies LLC
http://www.netcentric-strategies.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbenedict
http://twitter.com/krbenedict
***Full Disclosure: I am an independent mobility consultant and Web 2.0 marketing expert. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
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Mobile Expert Video Series: Smartsoft Mobile's CEO Dan Homrich

Dan Homrich, Smartsoft Mobile Solution's CEO likes to talk about mobile B2E (business-to-everyone) solutions for smartphones. These are mobile applications that companies provide to their customers, partners and service providers.

Mobile B2E solutions are intended to address large markets. Insurance companies can provide mobile solutions to their customer bases. Banks and retail companies can provide mobile applications to their hundreds of thousands of customers. This is a very interesting target market. Watch the video interview that I recorded with Dan Homrich at Sapphire and learn about his strategies.

Related videos:

The video interviews listed below can all be found here :

Mobile Expert Video Series: Open Text's VP SAP Solutions Group Patrick Barnert
Mobile Expert Video Series: Leapfactor's Luis Cabrera
Mobile Expert Video Series: Sky Technologies President Bruce Johnson
Mobile Expert Video Series: SAP's VP of EcoHub, Usman Sheikh
Mobile Expert Video Series: Infologix's Senior VP Brian Thorn
Mobile Expert Video Series: Syclo's Founder Rich Padula
Mobile Expert Video Series: Vivido Labs' Founder Greg Tomb
Mobile Expert Video Series: SAP Senior VP of Enterprise Mobility, Kevin Nix
Mobile Expert Video Series: PriceWaterhouseCooper's Director of Mobility, Dr. Ahmend El Adl
Mobile Expert Video Series: DSI's VP of Sales, Mark Goode
Mobile Expert Video Series: Sky Technologies' CTO Steve Ware
Mobile Expert Video Series: Mellmo's Santiago Becerra

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Kevin Benedict, SAP Mentor, SAP Top Contributor, Mobile Industry Analyst
CEO/Principal Consultant, Netcentric Strategies LLC
http://www.netcentric-strategies.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbenedict
http://twitter.com/krbenedict
***Full Disclosure: I am an independent mobility consultant and Web 2.0 marketing expert. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
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Mobile Expert Video Series: Open Text's VP SAP Solutions Group Patrick Barnert

I am a big believer in the saying "content is king!" So when I read recently that Open Text announced they were going to mobilize their enterprise content management products with a solution called Open Text Everywhere, I was intrigued but skeptical. Open Text provides powerful enterprise content management solutions, the SAP Invoice Management solution, and collaboration and social networking tools for the enterprise, but now mobile solutions as well? At Sapphire I was able to schedule a video interview with Open Text's VP SAP Solutions Group, Patrick Barnert. One of the first questions I asked Patrick was, "Are you serious or just playing around with mobility?" You can watch and hear his response here.

I appreciate mobile applications that add value in unique and powerful ways. The accounts payable processes in large enterprises is a very important area. Companies can save millions by processing invoices quickly and capturing early payment discounts from suppliers. The ability of a manager to approve an invoice while traveling so the company can capture these discounts can provide millions of dollars in savings with the push of a button on a mobile smartphone application. I like mobile applications with that kind of ROI! Open Text is developing that mobility solution now for SAP Invoice Management.

The video interviews listed below can all be found here :

Mobile Expert Video Series: Leapfactor's Luis Cabrera
Mobile Expert Video Series: Sky Technologies President Bruce Johnson
Mobile Expert Video Series: SAP's VP of EcoHub, Usman Sheikh
Mobile Expert Video Series: Infologix's Senior VP Brian Thorn
Mobile Expert Video Series: Syclo's Founder Rich Padula
Mobile Expert Video Series: Vivido Labs' Founder Greg Tomb
Mobile Expert Video Series: SAP Senior VP of Enterprise Mobility, Kevin Nix
Mobile Expert Video Series: PriceWaterhouseCooper's Director of Mobility, Dr. Ahmend El Adl
Mobile Expert Video Series: DSI's VP of Sales, Mark Goode
Mobile Expert Video Series: Sky Technologies' CTO Steve Ware
Mobile Expert Video Series: Mellmo's Santiago Becerra

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Kevin Benedict, SAP Mentor, SAP Top Contributor, Mobile Industry Analyst
CEO/Principal Consultant, Netcentric Strategies LLC
http://www.netcentric-strategies.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbenedict
http://twitter.com/krbenedict
***Full Disclosure: I am an independent mobility consultant and Web 2.0 marketing expert. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
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Mobile Expert Video Series: Sky Technologies' Steve Ware

I was able to meet up with Sky Technologies' CTO, Steve Ware, at Sapphire a few weeks ago and unfortunately for him I had a digital video camera in my hands. SAP had provided us SAP Mentors with very small Flip digital video cameras, and I recorded his views on MEAPs (mobile enterprise application platforms).

I also noted this week that Sky Technologies is now supporting Sprint's enterprise initiative for the new Android phone HTC EVO 4G as described below:

Sprint's new HTC 1GHz EVO- 4G smart-phone enables true multi-tasking while on the move. Road warriors can now view documents and files while simultaneously having a conversation with a colleague on the phone. With the large HTC 4-3 inch touch screen and superfast processing power, the HTC is aimed at customers who have serious mobile business requirements. The HTC EVO 4G boasts thousands of Android-driven mobile applications, with many geared toward businesses across a variety of industries.

Sky Technologies is a mobile applications company specializing in extending all varieties of business applications to any mobile platform. They have 12 years of experience in the enterprise space.

Related videos:
Mobile Expert Video Series: Leapfactor's Luis Cabrera
Mobile Expert Video Series: Sky Technologies President Bruce Johnson
Mobile Expert Video Series: SAP's VP of EcoHub, Usman Sheikh
Mobile Expert Video Series: Infologix's Senior VP Brian Thorn
Mobile Expert Video Series: Syclo's Founder Rich Padula
Mobile Expert Video Series: Vivido Labs' Founder Greg Tomb
Mobile Expert Video Series: SAP Senior VP of Enterprise Mobility, Kevin Nix
Mobile Expert Video Series: PriceWaterhouseCooper's Director of Mobility, Dr. Ahmend El Adl
Mobile Expert Video Series: DSI's VP of Sales, Mark Goode
Mobile Expert Video Series: Mellmo's Santiago Becerra

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Kevin Benedict, SAP Mentor, SAP Top Contributor, Mobile Industry Analyst
CEO/Principal Consultant, Netcentric Strategies LLC
http://www.netcentric-strategies.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbenedict
http://twitter.com/krbenedict
***Full Disclosure: I am an independent mobility consultant and Web 2.0 marketing expert. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
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Mobile Middleware for Instant Value or Mobile Micro-Apps

Mobile middleware is more than synchronizing databases and providing basic application integration. It needs to include support for business process extensions, and it must provide a set of features and functions that support lightweight, "Instant Value" or "Mobile Micro-Apps" smartphone applications.

There are many features and functions that are needed by mobile workers that are not easily supported by smartphone operating systems like iPhone or BlackBerry. Often the data set is large and the software application is an ERP. The mobile user does not need access to the full ERP or the full data set, just a subset. In these cases it would be useful to have a mobile middleware layer that recognizes the needs of the mobile user and provides an optimized mobile application with functionality that supports either browser based or mobile micro-apps.

It seems there is a need for a new middleware layer that is designed to support a wide range of requirements to address the limitations of lightweight and browser based smartphone apps.

Within the SAP ecosystem I am hearing a lot about this concept from the likes of Vivido Labs and Leapfactor.

Leapfactor says their mobile middleware layer forwards and broadcasts staged digital content collected at a location and delivers it to any designated consignees, on any smartphone, and always with high availability based on a secure and scalable platform. They state that their solution relies on four fundamental technologies:

LeapApps - mobile micro apps for smartphones
LeapShell - an SDK that accelerates development and portability to any mobile OS
Leap Central - a secure cloud-based service-processing component
LeapAgent - securely connects and authenticates LeapCentral with an enterprise

I spent a lot of time working on mobility projects that utilized Sybases' SUP (mobile middleware). The mobile applications were "thick" clients with mobile databases on smartphones to hold data and synchronize data with the back office database application. Our mobile applications often had complex business processes and business rules built into the mobile applications to ensure field work was done correctly. These rules were stored in the mobile database in the thick client.

Where are all of these business rules and business processes stored for "Instant Value" and "mobile micro-apps" for smartphones? Do these lightweight mobile applications simply ignore business rules and business processes, or is this functionality provided in a smartphone middleware layer in the cloud? These are the things I ponder on a Wednesday morning.

Do you see a need for a mobile middleware layer that is specifically designed to support business rules and business processes for mobile micro-apps?

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Kevin Benedict, CEO Netcentric Strategies LLC
SAP Mentor, SAP Top Contributor, Mobile Industry Analyst
http://www.netcentric-strategies.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbenedict
http://twitter.com/krbenedict
***Full Disclosure: I am an independent mobility consultant and Web 2.0 marketing expert. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles. ***************************************************