Handheld PDAs, Hurricane Katrina & Automotive

It was just before 8 AM and I received a very interesting call from a large engineering firm asking for our expertise. Seems they were bidding on an urgent project to locate and remove 150,000 abandoned cars in Louisiana following hurricane Katrina and they needed our help.

The requirements were for data collection software and handheld computers with integrated GPS and bar code scanners to enable the tow truck drivers to quickly identify abandoned cars by their VIN numbers, record the location of pick-up, and then document the location where the vehicles were towed. This information would be synchronized to a central web-based database.

Luckily, we were prepared for this opportunity since we had recently completed a vehicle inspection application using our PointSync solution. This enabled us to quickly respond to the emergency inquiry and commit to achieving their very short deliverable timeline.