9.9 Technical Factors in Mobile Business Usage


There are four levels of mobility use by businesses: informative, transactive, operative, and
collaborative. They are shown in Figure 9-11 as:


Figure 9-11: Mapping the technical dimension of MET to mobile Internet usage.





9.9 Technical Factors in Mobile Business Usage

Technical-Informative
The informative use can be in two ways: either as a general broadcast, or as an informative service requiring registration. The preregistered informative service would technically require a secure server and will encourage the business to conduct two way transactions.
   
Technical-Transactive
Transactive capabilities of businesses come into play when they want two-way transactions with customers. Technically, wireless networks are expected to provide the necessary speed, reliability, and security for such two-way transactions.
   
Technical-Operative
Technically, the operative use of mobility by businesses builds up and expands their transactive capabilities. The operational use requires attention to supply-chain management, inventory management, and all the internal HR functions. Therefore, the operative use of mobile technology calls for attention to content management as it deals with the uploading and dispersal of contents for internal systems.
   





9.9 Technical Factors in Mobile Business Usage


Technical-Collaborative
Collaborations among businesses and groups of individuals require that their devices and applications be able to communicate with each other seamlessly.
   
Mobile Web services (MWSs) have collaborative and technical capabilities that are relatively easy to
implement compared to the process, economic, and social challenges of collaborative usage.