Potential of handheld devices in India

NEW DELHI, INDIA: With over 600,000 villages and approximately 70 per cent of the population in rural areas, India’s heart lives in villages. To keep the heart hail and healthy, technology is playing a pivotal role as illustrated by the quick adoption of mobile phones, television, and Internet over the last decade

In fact, India’s rural population is seen as the largest worldwide target growth market for mobile devices. This adoption has been further fueled by several initiatives that the central and various state governments have undertaken. The launch of the Unique ID project (tipped to be the largest IT project worldwide) seems to have caught the imagination of the technology world from policy makers to hardware and software industry.

Portable handheld computing devices based on Intel Atom embedded technology can transform rural India by bringing e-governance and financial inclusion to the doorsteps of the villagers.

Technology for masses

Even in the current economic slowdown India has stood tall with upwards of 5 per cent GDP growth mainly driven by domestic consumption. There are various e-governance programs being undertaken in the areas of banking, healthcare, public distribution system and so on.

What does this mean for the hardware industry? If one looks a little deeper, then there are clear answers. For example, the Unique ID project would require enrollment of all Indian citizens, a mammoth task considering the vast geographical spread of the country. This would necessarily mean enrollment almost at the doorsteps of the citizens. Hence the need for a versatile mobile computing device for the accurate enrollment process.

This handheld mobile device would also need to be equipped with peripheral devices like cameras, biometric recognition and thermal printers as bare minimum for the enrollment and verification process.

Not only should this device perform these tasks with accuracy but also must be light in weight with battery to last one field day which could have 100 to 200 enrollment transactions. This makes it imperative for the processor to offer high speed yet consume minimum power.

There are various other e-governance projects like Reserve Bank of India’s Financial Inclusion Program with the goal of providing universal access to banking facilities to both semi-urban and rural segments (who have no access to basic banking services) who can benefit immensely from such a device.

Such a portable integrated handheld device can also make life easier for mobile health workers (auxiliary nurses, mid-wives, anganwadi workers and so on) who today cover 4-5 villages in the periphery of 8-10 km, contacting 70-80 people per week.

The mode of data collection is completely manual through registers or notebooks (7 to 8 in number each weighing 0.5 kg). This manual data collection process is ineffective and is saddled with issues like absenteeism, ineffective training mechanism.

Benefits

An adoption of mobile embedded computing technology can result in multifold benefits such as:

Increase in the transparency and productivity of the entire value chain

Efficient data dissemination and management to facilitate the effective resource allocation

Reach: Will tremendously increase the reach of the government to the people

Effective performance tracking mechanism and addressing the issues like absenteeism

Streamline of the administrative processes between the government and the people

Multiple usage models – reaching far and wide

The use of handheld portable integrated device is not just limited to help rural population and government projects but also to areas like sales force automation, logistics, inventory management to name a few.

Faced with slowdown and ever-increasing competition to retain customers, organizations are looking at innovative ways like deploying handheld devices with their field teams that allow them to have real-time information about their product’s performance in the market and at the same time cast off the age-old chains of paper.

Why for field teams? Firstly it is because of a large ‘on-the-road’ component of the business process wherein most of the sales team is either traveling or is at the customer’s location for the most part of any business day.

Secondly, the productivity gains that can be achieved by accessing or updating the real time data as against capturing it once a day or once a week are immense. Reduction in pilferage is another advantage that organizations can look at with the deployment of customized handheld devices by tracking the field force locations. Imagine a scenario where a sales person using a handheld device can connect with the ERP application and get a real time update on the inventory, and with the help of a CRM application quickly assess the customer to close a deal!

Similar usages and benefits can be seen in other verticals like courier, transport, aviation, manufacturing, and FMCG to name a few. The reduction in handheld pricing and cheaper connectivity are also spurring the adoption of such computing devices.

The woods are lovely but still miles to go…

Though the opportunities are immense there are multiple challenges in developing and deploying such devices. For example, a handheld computing device should be rugged, considering the intended user and the likely deployment scenarios i.e. outdoors. Given that India is a price-sensitive market the cost of the device is another huge consideration. Some of the other key challenges include:

Building an ecosystem to maintain such devices, training the end users and developing the required software applications

Incorporating localization features in the product for easier use by the target users

Interoperability with existing third-party peripherals

Managing heat dissipation by keeping the device rugged and light weight

Intel embedded technologies

Intel is committed to help develop the embedded market for handheld devices in India not only through Intel’s best in class, long life cycle embedded products but also by enabling the end-to-end ecosystem by working with players like Inforce (a board manufacturer), Procsys (design houses/ODM) and other leading players at different levels of engagement.

Intel’s products for embedded segment: One of the options available today for handheld devices is Intel’s Atom processor which has become the choice of majority for various embedded segments. The Intel Atom processor Z5xx series provides a variety of design options with 2.0 or 2.2 watts thermal design power (TDP), two package sizes, and industrial as well as commercial temperature ranges.

Based on 45nm Hi-k next generation Intel new microarchitecture, these processors implement ground-breaking power management techniques making them ideal for thermally constrained and fan-less embedded applications. The two-chip platform solutions help developers create a product line with diverse sizes and thermal requirements for handheld market segments. Some of the possible advantages of the Intel Atom processor that could help various ODM’s and OEM’s building such handheld devices in the embedded segment are:

Lower TCO (due to faster end-application portability on x86 architecture and easier availability of peripheral drivers) and faster time-to-market

Higher level of peripheral integration on the device which would enable service providers to bundle a greater number of applications/service on it

A greater performance per watts to address such high performance complex data transaction usage models

Long lifecycle support as per road map of Intel Atom embedded products

(The author is market development manager with the Embedded & Communications group at Intel South Asia. The views and opinions expressed in this article are that of the author and do not necessarily represent those of CyberMedia)

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