BlackBerry users boost efficiency by more than a third

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BlackBerry users are managing to turn 250 hours of downtime each year into productive activity, with the average fan of the device boosting team efficiency by 38 per cent, according to research published this week.

Each day, one hour of downtime is converted into productive time, with the average person using their BlackBerry to process 2,500 time-sensitive emails and 1,200 time-sensitive phones calls every year, claims the study of more than 1,000 IT managers in Asia Pacific, Europe, Latin America and North America.

The research - conducted by Ipsos Reid on behalf of BlackBerry parent Research in Motion (RIM) - also points to benefits in terms of hard cash, with the average using saving more than $5,000 (£2,500) each year thanks to immediacy of information and the device providing businesses with a solid return on investment (ROI) in around five months.

"These figures bring to light the tangible time saving benefits of BlackBerry," said Charmaine Eggberry, vice president and managing director for RIM in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA).

"With such clear benefits, mobile professionals can feel confident in choosing BlackBerry for its work/life balance benefits, in order to get the most out of each day."

However, despite the obvious business requirements to work effectively wherever and whenever employees want and the benefits on offer to those who embrace mobility, some companies still aren't fully switched on to what's needed.

This is particularly so when it comes to deploying field service mobility solutions, as highlighted by additional research (also published this week) by Freeform Dynamics on behalf of Momote, which revealed that just 20 per cent of large field service organisations are fully optimising these technologies.

The survey also found that just 10 per cent of the 100 field service businesses questioned were confident that they were using associated resources effectively. In addition, more than a third admitted that they fell short when it came to flexibility and half of respondents said that allocation of resources was a particular bugbear.

"Despite a lot of activity in the field of automation over the years, many service organisations still haven't cracked problems such as resource optimisation, service flexibility and visibility of operations," said Graham Whistance, Momote's managing director.

"In addition to the industry's failure to fully realise the potential benefits of first generation mobility solutions, the evidence suggests that the nature of IT solutions is changing, with many early adopters growing out of the fixed functionality solutions they originally put in place in favour of a platform approach providing more flexibility and real-time wireless capability."

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