Infomill PartsArena Mobile Launched on Smartphones

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Midnight's been busy again, and spotted this HERE

Infomill, a provider of mobile technologies for the MRO (maintenance, repair, and overhaul) market, today announced the launch of the Windows Smartphone version of its PartsArena Mobile product. All of the functionality enjoyed by field service technicians using PartsArena on laptops and PDAs to quickly identify required spare parts for equipment repair is now available on Smartphones.

“Field service technicians were telling us they could really benefit from having all of their technical manuals with them in an easy-to-use format to quickly find details for the right spare part for ordering,” commented Adrian King, Infomill’s director of software engineering. “They also told us that carrying unnecessary equipment to a customer’s site is a hindrance – but one piece of essential equipment that is always carried is a cell phone,” King added. 

Research suggested that the mobile workers and their managers were prepared to neither pay for the cost nor wait for Web pages to be downloaded. Further research indicated that mobile phone coverage of less then 100% could also cause problems in the field if users were dependant on real-time access for vital information.

“Initially, we had three concerns,” continued King. “We weren’t too sure the resolution or quality of Smartphone screens would be up to the job of displaying detailed exploded parts diagrams, whether the time taken to display graphics would be acceptable to users, and the best way of selecting graphic hotspots without a pointing device like a stylus on a PDA.” 

These initial concerns were soon dispelled with tests revealing Infomill’s strength in producing rapid graphic decompression and display technology coupled with zooming and Infomill’s new Predictive Hotspot Selection feature that preempts the field service technician’s area of interest. 

“We’ve ensured the same technical data set that resides on the technician’s device can be used on either PDAs or Smartphones using the flexibility of Microsoft’s Windows Mobile,” King explained. He went on, “PartsArena accesses compressed and encrypted technical manuals held on the technician’s device with only data update packets transmitted wirelessly when feasible by GSM, GPRS, 3G or connected through the Web or CD-ROM update – whatever is appropriate to the individual customer.”

PartsArena Mobile for Smartphones provides real-world hybrid connectivity options for large volumes of technical data held locally and remotely. “It’s really incredible how much information can be accessed on the device; for example, customer data comprising 50,000 pages has already been stored and accessed on an SD card within a Smartphone,” commented Infomill’s CEO, Jonathan Ralphs. “Supporting Smartphones with PartsArena Mobile has been an important development for our customers” Ralphs added. “Providing support for different devices using the same customer dataset for Web, PC, PDA, and now Smartphones means that service companies can quickly deliver benefits to their field technicians and make the same information available to their helpdesk staff and Internet customers.”