Business In An Unplugged World

Wireless networks have slowly but steadily evolved over the years, and so have the business processes that take advantage of their anywhere, anytime connectivity.

The number of wirelessly enabled PCs and peripherals is growing. According to market research firm In-Stat/MDR, in 2003 there were about 47 million wireless chipsets sold; that number is expected to reach 390 million by 2008. In-Stat/MDR is forecasting that by the end of this year, more than 79% of new laptops purchased will come with some kind of integrated wireless LAN support.

These unwired systems are finding their way into critical business-technology initiatives at a variety of companies. With 25 offices in three states in the Pacific Northwest and a sales staff that has to complete transactions in locations ranging from golf courses to farms and recreational parks, United Pipe & Supply Co. knew wireless connectivity was the best way to improve information flow throughout the company.

As United Pipe executives traveled to the company's various facilities, they often had trouble finding available wired connections to its private network, CIO Mike Green says.

"Due to the various ages of the building[s], they didn't know what the status of the wiring would be as they traveled," Green says. "You could imagine the expense that would be involved in trying to get the infrastructure up to par, just beginning with bringing in a wiring contractor to various buildings."Like most companies, the $130 million-a-year United Pipe wanted to keep costs down. So the wholesale supplier of pipe and other utility equipment in Idaho, Oregon, and Washington went to PC provider Gateway Inc. with two requests: Create an infrastructure that traveling executives could access to connect to the corporate data center as they moved from facility to facility, and make it easy for the sales staff to complete transactions at customer plants and remote sites.

United Pipe recently purchased 150 Gateway450 notebook computers with 802.11-based Wi-Fi capability for use by its executives and outside sales force. The company spent about $500 on Wi-Fi access points in each of its facilities, a cost that was considerably less than adding or increasing wired connections.

Traveling executives can now arrive at one of the company facilities, grab any available desk, and immediately access the corporate network. For group meetings, multiple executives can simultaneously log on to the wireless network. There's an added bonus to the wirelessly equipped laptops--travelers also can take advantage of the growing number of Wi-Fi networks in airports and commercial establishments throughout the country, Green says.

Once United Pipe's execs had wireless connectivity, the company rolled out Wi-Fi-enabled notebooks to the field sales staff. These let sales representatives connect to the the company's network while visiting customer facilities and other places where Wi-Fi is available.

United Pipe employees hook up to the Wi-Fi networks via PCMCI cards from various cellular providers, including AT&T, Nextel, Sprint, and Verizon, because none of the cellular companies has complete coverage in the areas United Pipe needs. Depending on what geographic area the sales reps cover, they're assigned a card to the carrier that provides the best coverage in the specific area."This enhances and accelerates the flow of information, and it now requires less inside resources to fulfill whatever customer requirements there may be," Green says. Now sales execs can use their trucks as offices while off-site at meetings and easily upload sales information right from their laptops. In the past, they'd have to call in orders on their cell phones, often as they were driving to their next appointment, Green says.

United Pipe has to pay closer attention to which cellular company provides the best price and performance at any given time. Cellular competition is fierce, and the carriers continually leapfrog each other in capabilities and coverage areas, Green says.When Ken Burt, executive of information systems at Canyon Independent School District near Amarillo, Texas, began an effort to revamp technology resources early last year, cost was a top concern. The school district needed to provide computer access to 13 campuses and five support facilities in a 700-square-mile area.

As part of a bond package passed by residents in the district, Burt had a $5 million budget to improve the technology infrastructure in the sprawling area, and he wanted to establish a high-speed connection between the two primary clusters of the district located in the north and south of the region, as well as ancillary high-speed connections to other campuses and facilities.

He first looked at a fiber connection, but that wasn't practical: The lines had to be installed underground because of right-of-way access regulations across roadways and railroad lines. It would have taken two-thirds of the budget just to create a single north-south fiber connection.

Burt and his colleagues found a less-expensive solution that cost about half that of the single fiber connection--a wireless network based on microwave technology from Ceragon Networks Inc. The district hired IBM to manage the project.Two large microwave towers were installed on the main north and south clusters, and smaller microwave antennas were placed at the individual campus sites to create 155-Mbps bandwidth.

Burt was able to install about 2,400 desktop computers with wireless access throughout the district, including one in each classroom, he says. The district had decided to move away from the "computer-lab" environment in which students had to go to designated computer rooms to access a network, and instead bring the computers directly into individual classrooms, Burt says.

Forty-nine mobile-computing carts were purchased, and each was equipped with 21 to 28 laptop computers from IBM and two 802.11b wireless-access points. Now a student can remove a laptop computer from its charging center in the cart, take it back to his or her desk, and make a Wi-Fi connection.

At the end of each day, teachers can select from a variety of streaming-video educational programs that can be downloaded using the microwave transmission for use in their classrooms the next day.

All the technology projects were finished over a six-month period and were functional for the start of the district's 2003-2004 school year.An important aspect of the overall technology outlay was to ensure that it would be flexible and modular enough to grow with the district. When a new high school was built earlier this year, Burt says, the district was able to add a microwave antenna, all the necessary switching equipment, and the desktop and laptop computers at the campus during a six-week period. If not for delays related to working around construction schedules, Burt says, it's likely the project could have been completed in two weeks.At some businesses, wireless handhelds are becoming critical conduits of enterprise applications. That's the case at Schlitterbahn Waterpark in New Braunfels, Texas, one of the largest and most successful water-based theme parks in the country. Leigh Murphy, director of information systems, attributes much of the success to customer satisfaction, which is key to ensuring return visits and maintaining positive word of mouth to attract new visitors.

One of Murphy's first projects after joining Schlitterbahn was to install fiber throughout the park, as well as adding new point-of-sale terminals and automated time clocks. Shortly after, she added 802.11b/g wireless-access points from Cisco Systems to revamp the customer-survey effort.

When Murphy joined Schlitterbahn in 2000, its IT infrastructure was virtually nonexistent, and its methods of tracking customer satisfaction and demographics consisted of paper-and-pencil surveys. The water park conducts two types of surveys: quantitative, which track the ZIP codes or countries of origin of visitors, and qualitative, which ask a series of questions related to the quality of the park's attractions and services.

In the past, the company sent employees out to survey guests with paper ballots, "which wasn't too great a method in a water park," she says. All of the survey data collected out in the field had to be rekeyed into computers, a particularly time-consuming task.

Today, the park uses wireless handheld devices to complete the surveys, and two employees gather 200 quantitative and 25 qualitative surveys each day, providing the park with about 30,000 surveys in the course of season, Murphy says.The wirelessly enabled handhelds have boosted the number of surveys park employees conduct by as much as 75%. As soon as a survey is completed, an employee can wirelessly transmit the information to the park's data center, where it can be correlated and directed to the appropriate areas within the company.

Initially, PalmPilot devices were used, but employees found the displays difficult to read in the bright sunlight. The park switched to Dell's Axim handheld devices, which Murphy says have helped transform the survey effort into a much stronger tool for improving services and targeting marketing.

Using the correlated ZIP code information, Schlitterbahn has been able to more specifically target its advertising efforts and determine if certain times of the year draw more visitors from specific geographic regions, Murphy says.

The quantitative surveys help the park understand what visitors like best and least--such as long wait lines--and the quality and value of its food stations, gift shops, and restrooms. The information lets the park concentrate efforts on items most often cited by the surveys.

For example, the surveys helped the park determine that a majority of guests had spent time at the park's Web site in preparing for a visit. Murphy and her team used that information to justify hiring an in-house Web developer instead of using contracted services as it has in the past.From taking surveys to uploading orders, wireless is becoming the communications choice for many businesses. It's time to unplug the computers.