A recent research by Motorola has found that over seven in ten information technology decision-makers in the manufacturing industry are looking to leverage mobile and wireless products to streamline operations. The study found that manufacturers with mobility applications saved a daily average of 42 minutes per employee.
According to the company, its Enterprise Mobility Manufacturing Barometer surveyed manufacturing IT decision makers in 14 countries across four continents, of whom 80% cited that mobility was more important for their organisations today than in 2008. This represents a 9% increase from previous research, indicating that importance of enterprise mobility applications continue to grow as manufacturers look to improve operational performance and productivity.
Over one-quarter of those surveyed identified inventory/materials management and sales force applications as their organisations’ top drivers for continued mobility investments.
Jim Hilton, senior director of global manufacturing solutions for Motorola enterprise mobility, said: “With more than 60% of the surveyed manufacturing IT decision makers stating that their organisation currently has a mobility strategy, it is clear that mobility is no longer viewed by manufacturing IT executives as the vision of the future but strategically important today.
In fact, more than one-half of those surveyed cited a competitive advantage through the use of mobile and wireless technologies to empower their shop-floor and field-mobility workforce to take advantage of opportunities in the marketplace.”
From a geographical perspective, all regions agreed that inventory management was a key mobile application for the manufacturing industry, while Asia Pacific highlighted the importance of customer-facing applications and the Americas and Europe touted sales force applications.
Respondents also provided insights into future mobility trends. Manufacturers plan to increase the use of voice-over-WLAN (VoWLAN), fixed mobile convergence (FMC) and various asset management/asset maintenance products over the next 12 to 24 months, according to the study.
