SAP Rolls Out Mobile Engine

SAP

The engine builds on previous SAP technology that worked exclusively in a wireless environment. The new implementation can be used in connected and disconnected state, and provides management capabilities and increased device support, said Howard Beader, director of product marketing for mySAP mobile business.

SAP's mobile engine provides technology on a number of different levels. For the mobile device, the company provides a Java-based run-time environment, a local Web server, a database layer, a synchronization layer and drivers that support peripherals such as printers, bar-code scanners and credit card readers. A middleware server based on SOAP provides connection and synchronization support as well as a deployment console.

IT administrators can use the deployment console to populate devices with applications simultaneously, rather than having to copy an image to a devices one at a time, Beader said.

The mobile engine works in mySAP environments where role-based data needs to be pushed to individual workers in the field, Beader said. For example, a salesperson could receive customer data from a CRM application and inventory information from a data warehouse application when in the field. Because the mobile engine works in a disconnected environment, the worker can access that information even if a wireless connection isn't immediately present.

"So he can do some analytics, check the customer's history and enter an order," said Beader. "Then he would transmit that wirelessly, or if that wasn't available he would sync back at the end of the day."

Beader stressed that the implementation was created using all open standards, including XML, SOAP and Java.

Increased growth in the mobile space prompted development of the new engine, he said.

"We've seen our customers over the last couple of years working in pilot mode and experimenting with mobile," he said. "We are now seeing more full-scale mobile deployments."