Oracle Buys Toa Technologies Enhancing Mobile Solutions for Field Services

So that is why the Toa Technology team canceled my Google+ Hangout interview with them last week.  They were getting purchased!  

Toa Technologies is a very successful cloud based provider of field service management solutions that is heavily involved in mobile technologies.  They had been accumulating a stellar team and was regularly announcing sales deals with companies that had thousands of service technicians working in the field.  That is precisely why I wanted to interview them!

I am impressed with Oracle's aggressive launch into mobility in 2014.  They were late to the game, but are really stepping up.  A few months back I wrote an article (http://mobileenterprisestrategies.blogspot.com/2014/05/oracle-mobility-emerges-prepared-for.html) about Oracles latest moves into enterprise mobility.

Here is the press release on the acquisition: http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/press/2254950

Oracle today announced that it has signed an agreement to acquire TOA Technologies (TOA), a leading provider of cloud-based field service solutions that manage and optimize the last mile of customer service for enterprises by coordinating activities between dispatchers, mobile employees and their customers.
TOA’s Field Service SaaS enables modern enterprises to continuously monitor real-time field service requests coming in from contact centers, to schedule the right field service representative to dispatch, and to use sophisticated business analytics to monitor and view current inventories, accurately predict service windows, and optimize field service operations. TOA’s customers have more efficient field service operations, lower costs of delivering field service, and deliver a superior customer experience.
TOA’s solutions manage over 120 million service events annually in more than 20 countries and include global brands across many industries including DISH Network, E.ON, Home Depot, Ricoh, Telefonica, Virgin Media and Vodafone.
Oracle Service Cloud, part of Oracle Customer Experience Cloud, is an industry-leading platform for online customer service, cross-channel contact center, knowledge management, and policy automation. Oracle ERP cloud solutions help accelerate productivity, allocate resources, and provide on-demand information access.
Oracle Service Cloud and Oracle ERP cloud solutions combined with TOA will empower innovative customer service organizations to drive operational efficiencies while bolstering customer satisfaction and exceeding service expectations through personalized service.
More information on this announcement can be found athttp://www.oracle.com/toatechnologies.
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Kevin Benedict
Writer, Speaker, Editor
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Military Revolutions, Code Halos and Enterprise Mobility

Revolution in Commercial Affairs
In the US Army they have a term called "Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA)."  It is often associated with the use of modern data collecting technologies, communications technologies, information analysis and the use of these technologies to improve strategies, doctrines and organizational structures.  The Army believes that in future warfare, the size of the opponent and their platforms [weapons], will be less reflective of military power than the quality of sensors [data collection] systems and mobile communication links and their ability to utilize information to their advantage.

I see a "Revolution in Commercial Affairs" happening today.  The same concepts and strategies learned  in the military have relevance for the enterprise.  Companies that can more effectively use "Code Halos" - the information that surrounds people, organizations, processes and products will be the winners.

What does this mean for your company strategy in 2014?  It means your enterprise must digitally transform and focus on improving its capabilities to:
  • Collect information faster
  • Communicate information faster
  • Analyze and filter information faster
  • Report the analysis faster to decision makers
  • Strive for the goals of being a "real-time" and "data-driven" enterprise
Mobile technologies play a critical role in this transformation.  However, it is very important we understand mobility is but an enabler of an overall "Code Halos" strategy.  The success of our enterprises over the next few years will largely be the result of how smart we are with the use of information.

There are at least three components required for digital transformation:
  1. Technological innovation
  2. Operation concepts and Strategies
  3. Organizational adaption
It doesn't help much if one person at the top has a good strategy and buys innovative technologies, but the rest of the organization does not understand the concepts behind it, or the role it plays in being more competitive.  Technological innovation needs to be a part of a strategy.  A strategy that changes the way the business operates in a manner that makes it more competitive in the market place.

Every organization needs to understand the seriousness of the Darwinian theory of survival of the fittest. Every employee should be seeking ways to innovate and contribute to making their company as competitive as possible.


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Kevin Benedict
Writer, Speaker, Editor
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

The Real Challenge of Mobile Apps is Real-Time

Can you imagine a scenario where you ask Apple’s Siri a question, and she says, “Can I get back to you in 5 minutes?”  Wouldn't that be irritating?  Information and requests for information have a shelf life. The information is requested at a specific time for a reason.  If you send me the information in 5 minutes I have probably moved on to something else.

In a recent survey I conducted with 79 participants involved in mobile technologies and projects, 83.7% said they or their clients' have IT systems that are too slow or incapable of supporting real-time mobile application requirements. That is a problem.

Many organizations are facing a challenging time supporting the real-time data requirements of mobile applications.  They are recognizing that significant work needs to be done inside their complex IT environment to ensure that data queries and reports can be produced instantly for use on mobile applications.  In many organizations upgrading and enhancing their IT ecosystem for mobile applications represents a major investment.  This is driving increased interest in cloud based solutions that often use newer and faster processes, designs and architectures.

Speed of response is important to the mobile user experience.  The speed in which your IT environment can support mobile applications is a competitive differentiator.  As more applications incorporate location, predictive and context aware elements, the speed of supporting IT systems will become even more important to the end user.  No one wants a turn-by-turn navigation system giving driving instructions that are delayed by 30 seconds, “You should have turned back there,” is not an acceptable response for most of us.

Retailers are also increasingly interested in interacting with onsite shoppers via mobile devices.  They want to recognize you, your shopping habits, past purchases and preferences and today’s shopping needs all while you are browsing their aisles.  This requires the ability to collect appropriate data, query databases and share relevant information with both the shoppers and the staff in the store so the customer’s experience is enhanced and the sales optimized.

None of this happens by accident.

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Kevin Benedict
Writer, Speaker, Editor
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Managing Mobility in the Workplace: Best Practices with 451 Research, HP and Kevin Benedict

Join me at 9 AM PDST, Thursday, July 24th for a lively discussion with 451 Research and HP on the topics of enterprise mobility, mobile printing, mobile strategies and trends.

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Kevin Benedict
Writer, Speaker, Editor
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Mobile Solutions, the Internet of Things, Code Halos and Enterprise Strategies, Part 1

Tactics without strategy are dangerous. ~ Robert Leonhard

If you believe as the authors of the new book Code Halos do, that data is the new competitive arena for businesses, then you will want to develop a strategy in order to compete.  What might that strategy look like?  It may be as simple as, "We believe the better we understand the needs and preferences of our individual prospects and customers, the more convenient and personalized we can make their experiences which leads to happier and more loyal customers that promote our business and help us grow."

Streaming music stations provide us with a useful example of this kind of strategy.  They enable me to personalize my music stations so I conveniently hear what I want, and as a result I listen to it more often.  Amazon Prime knows my family intimately.  They use this knowledge to enhance our shopping experience daily.  Netflix knows our history and preferences and enhances our experience as a result.

Do you have a Code Halos strategy?  Does your competition?  Do the new digital start-ups in your industry?

Let's assume for today - you are convinced there is a need for a Code Halos strategy.  Now let's consider tactics.
  1. What data would help you offer your prospects and customers an enhanced user experience on their smartphones or tablets?
  2. How can the data be used to enable a more personalized user experience?
  3. What is the best way to collect it?
  4. How do you ensure the data is collected in an honest and transparent manner with opt-in?
  5. How do you find business meaning in the data?
  6. How can new and different business meanings be discovered by aggregating seemingly unrelated data sources together?
  7. How can data from machines (M2M or the Internet of Things) add value to your other data sources?
  8. How can public and private databases be aggregated with "patterns of life" analysis and demographic data to discover new consumer insights?
  9. How can I collect data in real-time, analyze it and respond quick enough to be useful in a mobile first world?
  10. How can discovered real-time business meaning impact my real-time business tactics when interacting with prospects, customers, partners and employees?
These are just a few discussion starters for your next internal strategy session.  By the way, we (Cognizant's Center for the Future of Work) lead these workshops all the time.  Contact me if your organization would benefit from this discussion.

As identified earlier, one of the first questions to ask yourself is, "What data is useful?"  What data, if you had it, would provide insight that would enable you to provide a better and more personalized user experience?  If knowing your prospect is a male or female enables you to provide a better user experience, then how can you collect that data in an open, transparent and appropriate manner? Sometimes insight can be derived, while other times it just needs to be asked.  If customer X shops only for fashionable clothes popular with young ladies, then there is a pretty good chance the buyer fits that description.

Did you know that mobile phone usage patterns differ between males and females?  With a high degree of accuracy usage patterns can identify the sex of the user.  Also, having preferences for particular kinds of music and artists closely correlates with particular political leanings.  These are examples of derived insight.

Different data collection tactics provide different kinds of insights. Insights can be derived from historic data, or real-time GPS tracking for example.  One is historic, the other is NOW!  LBS (Location based services) and geo-fenced apps can trigger real-time product and services notifications, alerts, advertisements, discounts, etc., relevant to your immediate location.

Historic and real-time analysis may involve different systems, or the data can be combined in real-time to provide even greater business insights.  For example, historic data might provide insight into a "pattern-of-life" that reflects a white collar business commuter, getting off of work at 5 PM every day, picking up the kids from daycare, collecting their dry cleaning, grocery shopping, filling up the Tahoe with gas every 10 days, and getting take-out Chinese food 5 days a week.  Add in real-time LBS data and you can start looking for ways to add convenience and enhance this person's life through personalized products and services at just the right time and place.

Once you have identified the data you need to collect in order to derive business meaning, the next thing to consider is how that data can be used to personalize your user's experience.  What does the collected data trigger that enhances the user's experience?

Stay tuned for Part 2.

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Kevin Benedict
Writer, Speaker, Editor
Senior Analyst, Digital Transformation, EBA, Center for the Future of Work Cognizant
View my profile on LinkedIn
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies
Recommended Strategy Book Code Halos
Recommended iPad App Code Halos for iPads

***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and digital transformation analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

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