Mobile business apps middleware catches on
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(InfoWorld) - Industry experts maintain that many business applications vendors are still struggling to successfully port their tools to mobile handsets. But some software makers claim that by partnering with wireless specialists to develop their systems, they are selling more licenses to end-users today. While larger business applications companies, including SAP and Salesforce.com, have gone the route of internally developing mobile versions of their existing products, others, such as enterprise software vendors NetSuite and SugarCRM, are finding it makes more sense to partner with third-party wireless applications providers. In addition to the cost savings and reduced time to market that working with such partners allows -- versus architecting their own wireless applications or acquiring firms that can do so, as in the case of Salesforce.com -- advocates of the emerging middleware model for mobile business applications claim the approach results in far more mature wireless services for customers. "We originally approached wireless development internally ourselves, and we've developed a lightweight client that can work in almost any browser. But we found that by enlisting a partner that is focused completely on mobile applications we could create something much more compelling," said John Roberts, chief executive of SugarCRM, in Cupertino, Calf. "Mobilizing a product seems like a straightforward process, but the truth is that understanding the way that a user navigates the handheld application, what needs to be in there and what is most useful, involves a lot more work than taking a traditional application and pushing it to a different form factor," Roberts said. To get its business applications onto smaller screens faster and more effectively, SugarCRM enlisted the help of iEnterprises, a Murray Hill, N.J.-based provider of wireless tools that has long specialized in pushing CRM systems to wireless devices. The company currently offers handheld iterations of CRM products made by IBM's Lotus division, SugarCRM, NetSuite, and Microsoft, along with its own applications. At the core of iEnterprises' strategy is its own Mobile CRM software module, which it also sells as a stand-alone product. Having spent years developing the right mix of features and formats for pushing business applications such as sales force automation (SFA) tools to mobile devices, the company claims it is accelerating the pace with which its partners can offer wireless applications to their customers. "Everyone in business software is trying to build a mobile module, but many vendors are finding creating that is harder than they thought, and that using something like our module makes a lot more sense," said Phil Sheehy vice president of wireless solutions at iEnterprises. "Because of the form factor of today's devices, the limited memory and bandwidth constraints of the network, it's very important and challenging to get the right mix of features into the applications themselves," Sheehy said. "The tools have to have enough utility to be useful, but the temptation for many is to try and cram too much into the program, which has resulted in a lot of products that end-users have found too cumbersome or awkward." Industry analysts continue to criticize the functionality of many mobile business applications for exactly those reasons. "It's going to take years for enterprise applications to become mobile because these were largely designed for the PC within certain parameters, which doesn't port well to the handheld," said Maribel Lopez, analyst with Cambridge, Mass.-based Forrester Research. "Everybody wants mobile business applications but there's still a lot of massaging of the applications themselves that needs to happen before more customers will be ready to increase investment." Even those companies building the mobile devices agree that the middleware model for mobile business applications seems to make a lot of sense. Among the device companies iEnterprises is partnered with is Research In Motion, maker of the BlackBerry handhelds that have become arguably the most popular wireless business device in North America. "Companies like this that serve in the middleware role are bringing a lot of value to the market by allowing existing CRM companies and their customers to tap into mobility and pull in data from back-end systems," said Tyler Lessard, director of independent software vendor (ISV) alliances at RIM. "These companies have already spent a lot of time focused on making sure that CRM or other business applications work on a BlackBerry in the same way that popular mobile applications such as e-mail do," he said. "The larger applications vendors tend to offer a Web-based interface that can be used on the mobile device, but many customers are already looking for something richer that can store data locally; these customers are looking to middleware vendors to help." The middleware model is becoming so pervasive that some applications vendors have moved to acquire providers of the technologies, including Salesforce.com, which had previously worked with iEnterprises before buying Sendia, a provider of similar mobile products, for $15 million in April 2007. In addition to building wireless versions of its own hosted SFA tools, Salesforce.com has also committed to using Sendia's technologies to build mobile iterations of all the custom applications built by its partners under its AppExchange development program. Customers agree that the middleware-bred mobile systems are getting the job done well. Alan Tamny, national account manager for retail loss prevention specialists Checkpoint Systems, said that his company has been using iEnterprises' Lotus Notes CRM tools, along several other applications developed by the company, for several years with impressive results. Part of the lure of the applications is that they have been specifically tailored to work on the BlackBerry devices that Checkpoint has passed out to its workers, the executive said. "The ultimate endorsement is how well the applications get adopted by salespeople out in the field, as these types of workers won't use something like this unless they really see a benefit. The response has been really strong as these systems have worked so well," Tamny said. "We had to have something that was supported on BlackBerry -- that was probably the biggest driver of going with iEnterprises. But the information fits on the small screen really well and the synchronization with back-end systems works great, which is our biggest concern," he said. "Now our salespeople can truly have constant connectivity, which is a huge advantage in terms of them not having to replicate information into multiple address books and keeping data up-to-date without needing to sit down at a PC." Officials with Vettro, another mobile applications middleware player, said that many Fortune 1000 customers are approaching the firm in hopes of getting more advanced handheld technologies into workers' hands. Rather than building complete wireless applications or versions of other vendors' products, such as iEnterprises, the New York-based company sells its Vettro 360 platform directly to customers, who use it to create their own mobile applications, including field force automation programs. Large applications vendors and end-user firms may someday have the ability to build and support their own mobile applications, but company officials contend that there will likely always be a demand for middleware specialists that can help build and deliver the systems. "There's room for a lot of different types of players. It would be too simplistic to ever consider that one type of mobile applications provider or one model will take over. It really comes down to how much you're trying to do, and how core your mobile strategy is," said JiYoung Kim, vice president of marketing at Vettro. "The market is already evolving quickly," Kim said. "We started out building applications that largely shielded our customers from the complexity of mobility, but things have already begun to move more into customization and tailoring applications to whatever type of interface a customer needs to best configure their mobile devices for end-users."
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Software makers are partnering with third-party wireless applications providers to develop their mobile systems
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Determined to utilize mobile applications to improve operational efficiency, food chain Au Bon Pain is taking the outsourcing route to save time and money in getting wireless tools into its employees' hands.Faced with the prospect of managing the enterprise mobility equation on its own, from device acquisition to applications development, the company of more than 200 bakery and sandwich shops decided to hire an outsourcing specialist to handle almost every aspect of its strategy.In a move that some market watchers contend will represent an increasingly popular model for launching and maintaining wireless business tools, executives with the company said that it made more sense to offload as much of the process as possible onto its partner, startup Enterprise Mobile, than it would have made to drive its mobile plans internally.At the core of the company's strategy is the development and distribution of a proprietary business management application delivered over Microsoft's Windows Mobile architecture."There's only so much we can do with almost unlimited demand on IT resources. Some projects you simply have to outsource," said Ed Mockler, senior vice president of IT at Au Bon Pain. "This is very nascent technology; we believe it will be very powerful for us in the long run, but we don't have the same level of access to carriers or Microsoft that a dedicated outsourcing partner could offer."Enterprise Mobile is handling everything from device selection and service contract negotiation to working with the eateries' internal development teams to port its business application, dubbed the Daily P&amp;L, from the PC to the handheld environment.In addition to its ability to oversee nearly every aspect of its project, Mockler said that Enterprise Mobile's specialization around the Windows Mobile platform was a crucial factor influencing its commitment to outsourcing.While Research In Motion's Blackberry products remain the de facto leader in the enterprise mobility space, Mockler said that embracing Windows Mobile made the most sense for Au Bon Pain for a variety of different reasons.Because Au Bon Pain already works with a number of Microsoft technologies, in particular its .NET applications development environment, the executive said it made far more sense to build around the software giant's wireless products."Everyone makes a judgment call regarding technologies that will last and prove cost-effective. We thought that.NET would be that platform and felt that it was a prudent decision to continue in that direction with our mobile plans," Mockler said. "We felt that there would be cohesion on all the platforms down the road and wanted to avoid challenges that could be created by a lot of handoffs between different technologies."By pushing the Daily P&amp;L application from the laptop to the handheld, the executive said that Au Bon Pain's field managers can respond to business challenges more quickly and shift their travels among the chain's locations on the fly to address any emerging problems.When the application was tied to the PC, managers typically planned their routes ahead of time based on where they expected to be needed. Now the workers can garner detailed operational information in real time and move to cut off any business issues as they emerge, he said.Moving forward, Au Bon Pain is hoping to port other internal applications, including staffing management and forecasting tools onto handheld devices. Mockler said that the decision to adopt a mobile outsourcing strategy has already allowed the company to accelerate its planning for those future projects.Mort Rosenthal, chief executive of Enterprise Mobile, said that most businesses are only now getting to the stage in their wireless initiatives where the prospect of using outsourced services makes sense.IT departments and line-of-business teams have handled the process of selecting devices and negotiating calling plans up until now, but as customers grow into more mature, applications-driven aspects of their planning, acquiring the services of a dedicated mobility partner is becoming a more appealing alternative to keeping operations in-house, he said."There are so many moving pieces that as companies attempt to take more of their business applications to the handheld platform, they're realizing that the whole process can become very time-consuming and expensive," Rosenthal said. "As with any outsourcing decision, when companies reach the point where mobility is becoming too much of a burden on IT departments, more customers will decide to head in this direction."As for Windows Mobile, Rosenthal said that the Microsoft platform is also benefiting from growing maturity among companies regarding the types of applications they hope to push to the handheld. Prior to launching Enterprise Mobile in late 2007, Rosenthal founded Corporate Software, considered one of the earliest and most successful resellers of Microsoft's Windows and Office technologies."Blackberry carved out a great market based primarily on mobile e-mail, but as companies move to push more complex applications into the wireless domain, in particular those already built and running on Microsoft technologies, there will be growing adoption of Windows Mobile," Rosenthal said. "Companies want to take advantage of their existing investments in other Microsoft products."
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