Mobile technology in the spotlight at Capture 2011

Posted by Mark Brousseau

Smartphones are changing the way people shop, bank, communicate and travel. Now, these types of mobile devices are set to have a profound impact on how knowledge workers organize, access, and use business content, Anne Valaitis, associate director of image scanning trends for Infotrends, said during a keynote presentation this week at Capture 2011 in Dallas. In fact, the integration of mobile technology with data capture processes was a hot topic throughout the Capture 2011 conference.

“Mobile devices are changing how we read and work,” she said, noting that respondents to an Infotrends survey said they read 60 percent of their business documents on a screen versus paper. “As a result of mobile devices, we are accessing more content, in different ways,” Valaitis explained.

“Mobile technology is blurring the line between home and office and business and personal,” she said. Sixty percent of respondents to an Infotrends survey said they purchased their own smartphone or mobile handheld device, about half of the apps on these devices are for business, Valaitis noted.

The challenges facing data capture technology vendors and service providers today is to provide mobile tools and services that enable workers to easily plug into the existing IT infrastructure and business processes without increasing additional layers of complexity and cost, Valaitis explained.

Similarly, corporate IT departments must come to the table as an advocate for the mobile worker and help build bridges that will enable productivity, Valaitis said. “To this point, IT has had a hard time supporting these mobile technologies,” Valaitis said. But there is no time to waste. About half of the respondents to an Infotrends survey said they expect the amount of business-related work they conduct on their mobile phones to increase. What’s more, as knowledge workers return to the workforce, it’s likely they will rely on mobile technologies, Valaitis said: “It’s not clear whether they will work in an office, what tools they will need to be productive, or who will support their IT needs.

Workers already are increasingly mobile. Nearly 40 percent of respondents to an Infotrends survey said they were away from their primary work location at least once a month on business, she said.

What’s more, the evolution of technologies such as GoogleDocs will likely drive mobile adoption. “As some point, GoogleDocs will make it easier to create and edit documents in the cloud,” she said.

Valaitis also foresees growing acceptance of consumer technologies such as social media in the workplace. “Facebook is not just a personal media anymore,” she said, pointing to Goldman Sachs abolishing its policy forbidding Facebook use at work. “It is increasingly being used for business.”

What do you think?