ElectriCom is an independently owned utility construction contracting company, located in Paoli, Indiana with regional offices located across the Midwest, South, Southwest, and Southeast. They offer a wide range of services through their five major operating divisions, which include power and telecommunications construction, gas line distribution and right-of-way services. Their company motto “Our Work Sells Our Work” is exemplified in the accuracy and quality in the services they provide. When the company decided to modernize their field operations and how they captured data, they turned to MobileFrame for a solid foundation for their field service application strategy.

A Unique Inventory Challenge

The deployment of cabling and wiring is a significant business for ElectriCom, one that also requires accurate inventory management to ensure that line of business is driving maximum value for both the company and customers. These products are measured in granular detail and it’s up to the field service technicians to accurately measure the quantities deployed in the field so the customer is billed accurately. The techs also need to report what materials are returned to the warehouse after a project is completed, which is critical for capacity planning and future job bids.  The field force was collecting this data on paper and spreadsheets, then turning it over to the office staff to manually enter the data into their business systems. Management knew that this process wasted too much time and added too much complexity into the equation. The cost of labor and the fact that management didn’t have visibility into the data in a timely manner sent ElectriCom looking for a better way.

ElectriCom wanted a solution that could effectively handle the capture of this data real-time in the field, while at the same time seamlessly work with systems at the corporate office to process that data for actionable business decisions.  ElectriCom had a clear vision for their field service strategy, and part of that vision was to ensure that the company could grow rapidly and scale easily as new jobs were scheduled.

The company knew that they needed a single platform where they could deploy an unlimited number of apps with no coding required.  It was important for them to be able to quickly create new applications without spending months in custom coding projects. They also knew that they would want to change the apps over time as business needs changed and they wanted to be able to do all of this without being forced to pay the vendor for every change. Continue reading →

Sightpath Medical™ is the leading provider of mobile and fixed ophthalmic surgical solutions; available on demand when and where they are needed. The company provides simple, affordable ophthalmic surgical solutions for mobile refractive and cataract outsourcing. Nobody has a better reputation for its advanced technology, skilled ophthalmic technicians, personalized solutions and responsive support, which is just one of the reasons why Sightpath turned to MobileFrame when it was time to improve their operational efficiencies.

The company’s field technicians are responsible for assisting eye surgeons who are located in both rural and urban communities around the country. The Sightpath technicians are also geographically dispersed and don’t always have easy access to company locations to replenish their inventory. Instead, the technicians are sent shipments of inventory required for their upcoming surgery cases. In the past, each technician was required to manually enter data about the shipments received and inventory used every day into their business system. Tracking the movement of inventory and replenishing the technicians supply was always a complex process handled with a lot of manual data entry, human error and telephone calls to the office. As a result, the field service team had to spend a large portion of their time managing the manual processes instead of focusing on their customers.
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Los Gatos, CA (March 25, 2014) – MobileFrame LLC, the industry leading cross platform mobile application development platform, announces that Astrum Solar has standardized on MobileFrame’s Configurable Mobile Application™ platform to assist with Inventory Tracking.

Founded in 2007, and recently ranked #2 on Inc. magazine’s fastest growing private U.S. companies 2012 list, Astrum Solar is a national, full-service residential solar provider headquartered in the Eastern U.S. Astrum Solar serves homeowners and small businesses in California, Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Washington, DC and West Virginia. Astrum selected MobileFrame to facilitate the electronic collection of inventory data and serve as an extension of their Rootstock Inventory Management Solution into the warehouse. The solution will integrate with Rootstock in real time eliminating the need to manually reconcile inventory transfers, work order issues & reversals, and PO Receipts manually.

“We anticipate a huge ROI for this project by eliminating the bottlenecks associated with manually reconciling inventory on paper. We’re looking forward to a successful relationship with Astrum Solar as they continue to grow and dominate their market.”

– Patricia Oswalt, MobileFrame EVP of Sales and Marketing

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Los Gatos, CA (December 27, 2013) – MobileFrame LLC, the industry leading cross platform mobile application development platform, announces that Automatic Building Controls, Inc. has standardized on MobileFrame’s Configurable Mobile Application™ platform for a wide variety of mobile applications across the enterprise.

Automatic Building Controls, Inc. was founded in 1986, with headquarters located in Sioux Falls SD offering commercial fire alarm services including clock systems, nurse call, security, access control, video surveillance, intercom, and batteries.

Automatic Building Controls was looking for a more efficient way to collect work order and inspection data, and to eliminate hassle of manually entering data into their back-office systems. By leveraging the MobileFrame platform Automatic Building Controls will be able to combine mobile, web, and server-side technologies to connect the office to the field like never before. The solution will eliminate the cumbersome paperwork and provide the team with access to accurate data in real-time, enabling the management team to make strategic decisions based on actual data.

“We are always excited to see forward thinking companies leverage the MobileFrame platform to connect the office to the field. Replacing the paperwork associated with field work orders and inspections with mobile applications not only makes data collection easier, it provides a huge ROI.”

– Patricia Oswalt, MobileFrame EVP of Sales and Marketing

Automatic Building Controls, Inc.
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Los Gatos, CA (November 11, 2013) – MobileFrame LLC, the industry leading cross platform mobile application development platform, announces that Valley Regional Fire Authority has standardized on MobileFrame’s Configurable Mobile Application™ platform to assist with Inventory & Asset Tracking.

Headquartered in Auburn, Washington, Valley Regional Fire Authority (VRFA) offers fire protection and suppression, emergency medical aid, hazardous materials response and a number of other services to 80,000 citizens in a 37 square mile area covering Algona, Auburn, and Pacific Washington. VFRA chose MobileFrame software so that field workers could view inventory, update inventory status and track assets electronically.They had previously been collecting data on paper and manually entering the information into Microsoft Dynamics GP (Great Plains). MobileFrame has automated the data collection process and eliminated manual data entry by integrating directly to Microsoft Dynamics GP.  Now the field staff can view information that they need to do their jobs in real-time and the management team has instant access to the latest inventory levels and asset locations.  Automating their manual processes has streamlined the staff and has resulted in a significant return on investment.

“We love to see organizations leverage the MobileFrame platform to extend the capabilities of their ERP solutions out into the field. Our software has made their field force and the office staff much more efficient and is saving countless labor hours of administrative work. And, with our code free platform VRFA can deploy an unlimited number of applications for any department.”

– Patricia Oswalt, MobileFrame EVP of Sales and Marketing

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Los Gatos, CA (April 26, 2013) – MobileFrame LLC, the industry leading cross platform mobile application development platform,  announces  that Sightpath Medical has standardized on MobileFrame’s Configurable Mobile Application^TM platform for a wide variety of mobile applications across the enterprise.

Sightpath Medical is the leading U.S. provider of on-demand equipment and services for cataract and refractive surgery. More than 200 Sightpath employees serve hundreds of surgeons and facilities in both rural and urban communities across the country. Continue reading →

Los Gatos, CA (February 21, 2013) – MobileFrame LLC, the industry leading cross platform mobile application development platform,  announces  that Sierra-Cascade Nurseries has standardized on MobileFrame’s Configurable Mobile Application^TM platform for a wide variety of mobile applications across the enterprise.

Sierra-Cascade Nursery, Inc. was founded in 1977, with headquarters located in rural Susanville, California and is engaged primarily in growing high-elevation strawberry plants which are sold to fruit growers in central and southern California.  Sierra-Cascade grows the plants, then sells them to fruit growers once they reach a certain size and before they flower. They need to track the plants all the way through the process from harvest to warehouse, to cutting and shipping. Examples of the data they need to collect in the field include the species type, the ranch where they were grown and the date harvested. Continue reading →

Los Gatos, CA (September 25, 2012) – MobileFrame LLC, provider of the only cross-device mobile application development platform that requires no custom coding to develop custom enterprise mobile apps, announces that Corpac Steel has selected their Inventory Tracking Application.

Corpac is a global supplier and trader of pipe and steel products and services, specializing in line pipe, standard pipe, OCTG, Conduit and structural products. They receive pipe from their fabricators and need to know what pipe was received and the associated information about that pipe. Prior to implementing MobileFrame, Corpac was collecting this inventory data with pen and paper. Corpac Steel knew that keeping track of assets and inventory is necessary to ensure timely maintenance and proper supply, but tracking so many varied assets and items on paper presented a lot of challenges. With a paper-based system, the data error rate is high due to the amount of data collected on a variety of paper forms. They found this process to be time consuming and inefficient, and knew it was time for a change. Continue reading →

Inventory and asset tracking are both important, but what separates them?  Why are there different applications for these seemingly similar processes?  The answer lies in the purpose for each but first let’s examine the difference between inventory and assets.

Assets are defined as an economic resource that represents an ownership of value.  This could be a truck, a piece of software or, yes, even an inventory of widgets.  Inventory is a list of compiled assets for sale or use in another process.  When it comes to the differences in tracking we need to look at assets as being here for long term use and inventory being here for consumption of some sorts.  Think of it as the difference between a library and a book store.
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Five warehouses, over 240 different product lines, and one bi-directional integration with Oracle 11g to maintain current inventory.  That was the set of circumstances, and the task at hand was to deploy a custom solution to manage physical inventory, across the enterprise.  Oh yeah, and it had to be implemented within two weeks.

Mission Impossible?

Not for MobileFrame.

This was the mission for a recent client.  Inventory data was held in their Oracle database yet the physical inventory was spread across 5 warehouses.  Inventory tracking was done on paper forms, resulting in time consuming errors so there were definitely efficiencies to be gained by going mobile.  This required a bi-directional custom application to interact with the existing database.
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