B2M Solutions, specialists in the management of the mobile enterprise, announces significant enhancements to its mprodigy mobile management suite driven by customer demand for greater flexibility, scalability, multiple device support and additional security. These additions mean mprodigy 1.7 implementations can be scaled up by customers to provide all the management information required for control over an entire mobile infrastructure. Along with the global time zone support, this makes mprodigy truly deployable to large global mobile operations.
Julie Purves, Managing Director of B2M Solutions says, “Our customers and partners have worked with us to ensure mprodigy continues to provide a robust solution to the management of many thousands of mobile devices, often with mixed device populations from various manufacturers. This is particularly important as the use of mobile equipment is developing rapidly.”
For example, the parcel industry is expanding from traditional line of business applications like Proof of Delivery to more general usage such as job scheduling, route planning and optimisation. As these devices perform more and more business critical tasks, a robust and adaptable management solution is essential. With a holistic overview of its entire mobile operation, an organisation then has the control it needs to deliver a return on its mobile investment.
This new release of mprodigy 1.7 offers increased flexibility to run line of business applications alongside other more generic applications and various available networks, as well as maintaining control of the way in which the applications and networks can be used. mprodigy 1.7 also has a range of new filtering and search facilities to make it far easier to scale up a mobile operation. In addition to supporting many new types of ruggedised and non ruggedised devices, the 1.7 version has enhanced wireless security features.
Flexibility with control
For customers who need the flexibility to run line of business applications as well as a level of access to other applications and networks, mprodigy can restrict or “lock down” access to applications and settings on the devices. This new Device Kiosk feature offers the ability to specify whether a user can switch between different applications, turn different networks on/off or control the GPRS radio (available on phone edition devices). The “lock down” feature can only be over-ridden through the password controlled supervisor functions.
“If a device user tries to access a restricted feature such as the File Explorer and Internet Explorer, or if they attempt to use the built-in network manager when Network Control is not allowed, then access will be denied. Access to Bluetooth, Phone, Wireless LAN and GPRS Connection settings is also restricted by the mprodigy Device Kiosk,” explains Jenny Plaister, Marketing Manager at B2M Solutions.
Device Support
Many new types of device are supported in this latest release, including the latest models from mainstream manufacturers of ruggedised devices such as Motorola (Symbol) and Intermec, together with devices from new manufacturers that are now appearing in the European market such as Mobile Compia.
“mprodigy is totally device agnostic,” Julie Purves adds. “And this is becoming increasingly important with the proliferation of new devices from the Far East in the market. In addition, our customers recognise that they can use ruggedised devices for critical business applications alongside semi/non ruggedised devices for more ad hoc applications.”
Julie continues: “mprodigy’s ability to support a mixed device environment is a rarity in the market. Customers and partners focusing on business critical applications today know that they will require support for all types of devices over the coming years and mprodigy is an essential part of making this possible. mprodigy therefore provides a future-proofed solution.”
Scalability
B2M’s mprodigy has always been tested for effective operation with 10,000+ devices. Now a new range of filtering and search facilities make it easier to manage many thousands of devices. These facilities deliver greater access to information about devices which is presented in a clear and easy to use interface through the mprodigy management console.
Device List Filters can be defined to control which devices are displayed based on Location, Group, Last Seen Location, Device Manufacturer and Device Type. Searching for devices can be based on Asset Tag, Serial Number or Device Label and any of the last ten devices to be viewed can easily be found within the Sticky Devices List.
Security
For added security, mprodigy has increased support for wireless networking standards such as WPA2.