It’s not surprising that there will always be a need for the best-in-class software (applications) in the business of all types, regardless of industry.

In today’s digitally driven marketplace, keeping pace with customer’s expectations, which are developing as rapidly as technology is progressing, is difficult.

Reduce Costs: CIO StrugglesThe landscapes of business applications are expanding in every arena; keeping constant pressure on organizations’ CIOs to figure out how to create as many applications as possible that can be easily adapted and maintained while minimizing costs.

Organizations are tired of paying ongoing, recurring costs to hire and build & maintain high-code environments.

High code development platforms don’t only add cost to the organization, but they are also are complex and time-consuming to manage and maintain.Gartner found that CIOs are often expected to drive progress within their organizations—and enterprise application platforms can help.

“Digital processes will likely grow from taking up approximately 44 percent of the business to 77 percent of operations over the course of the next five years.”As the manner in which business applications are being developed, deployed and maintained is fundamentally shifting, it’s high time for businesses to embrace a new, innovative approach, i.e.

Failing to digitally transform will lead to extinction for enterprise businesses in today’s market.

To avoid extinction, enterprise organizations are seizing on plummeting costs of technologies and transforming into Digital Enterprises.

While we are still in the early stages of the Digital Transformation, organizations failing to take advantage of strategic initiatives, such as embracing Wearables, to better enable their workforce and improve productivity will fall behind in defining their long-term futures.Key drivers behind the move to digital, and embracing real-wear, for enterprise organizations areEnhanced customer experienceOperational excellenceNew business modelsBusiness process innovationsIncreased employee engagementSMAC Technologies (Social Media, Mobile, Analytics/Big Data, and Cloud) are key enablers behind companies embracing Digital but they all tie back to the experience of the user, be that the Customer, Supplier, and Employee.

For the purposes of this blog, we will focus solely on the Employee.Reconnect the Disconnected EmployeeDespite the umpteen advances in technology, organizations around the globe, big and small, still struggle with the ability to connect and stay connected with each other and their employees.

Employees need full use their hands when in the field as well as full concentration when using them.

Wearables allow employees full access to their hands while carrying out computer-aided activities in real-time such as scanning barcodes with glasses or inputting item numbers on a smartwatch.Realwear, such as headsets and smartwatches, can be equipped with software enabling workers to determine the health of assets quickly and make necessary adjustments in maintenance to alleviate stressors.

In the world of manufacturing, Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is a logical extension of automation and connectivity, accounting for the maximum share of today’s global IoT spending.

For businesses involved in the production and transportation of physical goods, IIoT provides higher operational efficiencies, new business models, and serves as a logical extension of automation and connectivity.Industrial IoT opens many opportunities in automation, optimization, asset performance management, new ways of servicing customers, and the creation of new revenue models.

To survive in today’s hyper-competitive business environment with highly disruptive technologies; companies are heavily investing in IIoT to increase growth and maximize productivity.

IIoT has the potential to drive productivity and improve operating costs across multiple industries, including manufacturing, oil and gas, and mining.IIoT in manufacturing creates smarter environments with greater visibility helping companies to optimize their operations and better prepare for future demand.

Industrial IoT-based solutions enable employees to access relevant information, and supporting application, from mobile devices anytime, from anywhere.

By providing real-time monitoring, companies can fully utilize their assets with improved performance.Asset Utilization: Implementing Industrial IoT solutions enable companies to track asset performance, predict failures, and increase the efficiency of operations.Predictive maintenance: It helps companies monitor equipment health, schedule maintenance based on usage, and performing more effective preventive maintenance eliminating unplanned downtime.

In today’s hyper-competitive era, it takes months to find a customer but only a small mistake is enough to lose them.

Companies need to understand the importance of real-time information/communication in field service operations.Effective field service operations are key to the success of any company with a sizable field service organization.

Companies involved in field services need to successfully manage their day-to-day operations, utilize their valuable assets, and maximize productivity while providing exceptional customer service.Currently, field services workers/technicians rely on time-consuming paper-based processes to work in the fields, which are mostly far away from their office location.

Moreover, unavailability of real-time information makes their work hectic, keeping them less engaged in their work.

To keep their field workforce engaged, companies require more than the “basics” so they are arming their service technicians with the best technologies that can make the difference.Today’s customers not only expect fast services, but they also want their issues to be attended to and resolved immediately.

Equipped with all the field-ready functionality needed to improve efficiency in the field from the mobile device, mServiceOrder helps improve workforce productivity.mServiceOrder provides a refined interface, consistent access, and targeted service workflows regardless of internet connectivity.

The increasingly competitive landscape is putting intense pressure on manufacturers, who still rely on traditional processes and legacy systems.

Consequently, becoming more agile in their response to customer demands in a complex, ever-changing, global supply chain.To effectively embrace digital technology, it is critical for manufacturing organizations to understand the challenges they face along the digital transformation journey:#1 Outdated Processes:  With everything connected digitally, it is challenging to rely on traditional paper-based processes and operate in silos; there is no longer a place for manual, time-consuming processes.

To be efficient and provide employees a flexible approach to work seamlessly, organizations (manufacturers) need a modern and agile digital solution that replaces outdated and error-prone paper-based processes and converts them to digital.

#2 Organizational Resistance to Change: Where does your organization sit on change?

Most employees are so entrenched in traditional processes of daily duties that, when the time comes to improve processes and incorporate new technology, they resist.

To achieve this, organizations should employ digital technology that provides exceptional efficiency within their existing legacy systems.

With more than 20 million Field Technicians around the world, the Field Service industry is a giant and growing stronger every day.

The use of these evolutionary technologies is contributing to increasing margins, improving customer loyalty and, most importantly, generating revenue for all organizations.#1 MobilityAs the field service industry experiences massive growth, companies are taking advantage of emerging technologies to transition from manual, time-consuming service operations while preserving legacy information.

Oftentimes, field service technicians need to go far into the field to fix issues or respond to service calls on equipment.

In such conditions, a drone can be sent to predict potential safety hazards before sending technicians on-site.Field visits are costly, whether they are scheduled inspections or alarm responses.

location information, product data, stock/inventory), which can be labor-intensive to track.Whether smart glasses or head-mounted tablet (HMT), wearables have many benefits for field service.

They provide cost savings and enhanced customer experiences by empowering field service technicians to fix issues faster.

Many industries, such as Oil and Gas, Mining, Manufacturing, Automotive, and Transportation & Logistics, rely on smooth supply chain performance, especially those with operations in remote locations.

Due to said change, companies should be mindful when managing logistics remotely, as the tasks involved can be cumbersome around procuring, storing, and transporting goods in more than one remote area.

Despite having the best-in-class software in place, i.e., SAP ERP, many companies fail to achieve its ROI due to dependency on slower, paper-based processes and the unavailability of access of real-time data.

To make the right, and best decisions, users/managers should have full visibility and access to real-time data, but the limitations mentioned above thwart the goal of end-to-end transparency and may lead to customer dissatisfaction, resulting in potential lost profits for the supply chain.With digitization taking hold in today's business environment, companies expect faster time-to-market as they need to drive greater efficiency to achieve profitability while simplifying complex operations.

Companies need to take control of their supply chain and ensure processes take place seamlessly, at excellent speed to meet customer demand.

Since the success of a company largely depends on their supply chain efficiency and the extent to which it can delight its customers, an effective inventory and warehouse management is even more crucial for sustainability as business transactions take place on a global scale.mInventory is the Solution!Innovapptive's solution for Inventory and Warehouse Management – mInventory  - allows users to perform day-to-day inventory transactions via handheld devices and laptops by accessing Master Data of SAP.

They are facing increased competition and, as operations are growing increasingly complex, utilities need to take a more flexible approach to business processes and mitigate technology risks to stay ahead of the competition.

With the Cloud comes a lot of compelling business opportunities including the ability to bring new business models to market quickly.Worldwide spending on public cloud services and infrastructure is forecast to reach $266 billion in 2021.

They can quickly scale computing resources in any quantity at any time to meet their needs.

Cloud-based solutions not only make it easier for utilities to run their operations without having to devote resources but also offer substantial cost savings for building area and maintenance of IT hardware and software.

In the cloud environment, apps can be developed quicker and more reliably than the apps of old.

The speed of innovation with cloud computing puts traditional software development at a severe competitive disadvantage.

Consider the potential of equipping your field service technicians with high-tech wearable accessories to Improve Mean Time To Repair (MTTR), Reduce Inventory Loss, and Increased Productivity.Improve Mean Time to Repair (MTTR)Availability, reliability and other key performance metrics, such as mean time to repair (MTTR), can be calculated automatically by your systems and fed to reporting dashboards on wearable devices, aka wearable.

This reduces potential human errors in capturing downtime and ensures that data as accurate as possible.

In addition, reliability metrics from different customer sites can be analyzed to identify best practice for implementation from around the world.

With this data, field service technicians can complete jobs the same day as the tickets come in.

When combined with personalized marketing campaigns, preventable maintenance metrics can remind organizations to preemptively service their equipment.Reduce Inventory LossSmart watches are not just for fitness and health anymore!

Pedometer functions in smartwatches communicate with smartphones and measure efficiency and ergonomics by tracking steps needed to execute specific operations.

Corrections to these errors leads to rework and waste of employees’ time and effort.A leading concern for many CIOs is the overhaul and improvement across all business functions, from the procurement of raw material to finished goods to reaching out to customers, thus improving time to market.

Enabling greater production and service agility with existing IT systems/resources is must to achieve success for any manufacturing company.

Companies need the best solution to drive higher revenue growth by utilizing the available IT infrastructure they have in place.Increasing employees’ productivity as it directly contributes to growth and is vital for company survival in this competitive market is another chief concern for any manufacturing company.

They can increase uptime, react faster to issues, and satisfy customers more consistently when they have greater visibility into their operations and asset performance.

Real-time information and instant updates are critical to the production process to eliminate revenue loss.

The more accurate and consistent the data is, the better the decision-making process.

Oil & Gas is a very practical industry and has led the way in information technology adoption since the 1960s when British Petroleum (BP) was mapping oil reservoirs in Alaska wilderness with oil recovery technology, then considered far advanced for the time.

Everchanging market pricing for crude is forcing oil & gas companies to reevaluate every aspect of their operations.

Enter the day and age of “The Cloud” or an “emerging model of computing where machines in large data centers are dynamically provisioned, configured, and reconfigured to deliver services in a scalable manner, for needs ranging from scientific research to video sharing to email,” (First Monday, 2009).Cloud computing is one of those technologies that is having a surmountable impact on oil and gas as most, if not all, new digital solutions run on cloud computing and some of the necessary solutions in the remote oil fields wouldn’t exist without it.

Cloud-enabled technologies provide the ability to rapidly develop applications that can access data across the enterprise which, in the oil & gas environment, is crucial especially as the industry transforms to meet more dynamic market challenges.Oil & Gas, as a whole, has gone through an unparalleled transformation in the past five years with cloud-enabled technologies providing the ability to develop applications that can access data across the enterprise rapidly.

Since “How” of connectivity and bandwidth are no longer issues plaguing the minds of the organizations, the “What/What If” questions still remain as nagging factors:What do people connect to?Is the data being transmitted and transferred to the Cloud building valuable enterprise information?Most importantly, is the data secure?Aside from the factors and questions, the benefits of the Cloud to Oil & Gas Companies cannot be ignored.Scalable - All companies are looking for effective and efficient ways to scale their systems, or grow quickly, as demands increase.

With digitization in full swing, oil and gas companies are moving to cloud environments which offer the ability quickly scale their environments based on data storage capacity needs or scale it down to meet the demands of the growing business.Oil and gas companies often need to build custom-made solutions for their organizations which would benefit from the cloud environment.

Despite using the best-in-class software (SAP), are your maintenance costs are not going down?Are you plagued with decisions to reduce maintenance costs related to materials and manpower?If your answer is yes to any of the above questions, then your (manufacturing) organization follows a reactive maintenance approach.Moving from reactive to proactive maintenance is a multi-phase process, requiring streamlining processes and providing maintenance crews access to real-time information.

When a manufacturing organization manages maintenance effectively, it sees greater asset reliability and improved margins as well as reduced maintenance costs and much more.

Despite knowing the advantages of proactive maintenance, many manufacturers are still following a reactive approach for plant maintenance.The overall satisfaction measures success the customer gets with the result, no longer just by a "job well done".

In today’s environment, where manufacturers are challenged with increased competition, they are under pressure to improve asset and production reliability and maximize ROI consistently.

It is a must for companies to reduce downtime and extend the equipment lifespan.

Organizations must make their maintenance functions proactive instead of reactive which reduces maintenance expenses and parts inventories without compromising safety or quality.The Best-Fit Mobile Solution for Plant MaintenanceTo help manufacturing organizations move from reactive to proactive maintenance,  reduce downtime, maximize ROI, and provide maintenance crews with all required information to execute maintenance activities effectively, Innovapptive offers a solution for Plant Maintenance, mWorkOrder.

Years back, when people heard the term “Drone”, an evil looking robotic plane capable of reading minds would come to mind.

Maneuvering effortlessly around flare stacks, oil rigs, under decks, and along miles of pipeline, these rugged, remote-operated “birds” are saving organizations millions of dollars and make field inspections safer than ever before.Drones for Oil Rig InspectionsWhether scheduled inspections or alarm responses, field visits are costly, both in time, resources, and money.

Now, as it was then, shutdowns are still as costly but, with the capabilities of drones equipped with small cameras, field personnel can look for problems while the stack is still operating to determine what needs to be fixed, before shutting down operations.Drones for Pipeline InspectionsInspection of pipelines can be a difficult task depending on locations and size of the project(s), especially considering the pipelines can span for thousands of miles and are subject to the variances of nature and climates.

Ultimately, lines face the risk of undetected leaks which could lead to damaging fires and explosions, may cause loss of life, damage to the environment and economic losses for the operator.To curtail instances like the above, pipeline networks undergo regular inspection and monitoring.

Monitoring of over the ground pipelines requires the use of sensors to detect rust or corrosion.

If the pipeline is under the ground, there is a need to detect the existence of methane or alteration in the surrounding vegetation that could indicate a potential damage.Drones are increasingly being used by pipeline operators for mapping of pipelines and surveying of the lines as well as a right of way monitoring, etc.

The demand for mobile applications is drastically increasing day-by-day with the digital era sweeping across the modern business landscape.

Traditional methodology of application development simply does not fit into today’s market and it is expensive, both in time and money.

"  - GartnerTop 5 Reasons to Choose No-Code App Development:#1 Use of Internal ResourcesOne of the biggest reasons why companies opt for a No-code platform for app development is to offset a lack of internal IT skills and/or internal resources and costs associated with both.

Using a No-code platform, companies empower their business users and citizen developers to easily create business applications based on their needs without requiring the additional resources; any user or citizen developer with some knowledge of technical skills can create applications.#2 Quick Response to Change ManagementBusiness requirements are constantly in flux making it difficult for software developers to change coding midway through development.

No-code platforms help businesses eliminate the backlog of applications and enable rapid time-to-market by streamlining the development process.

As a result, in-house developers can focus on solving other pressing business problems rather than struggle with application development challenges.

With the advent of smartphones and tablets – mobile apps are enriching every sector of the world and are paving the way for highly immersive customer experiences.

Consumer-grade apps create opportunities for companies to make dramatic changes to both the way they work and how they engage with staff, vendors/partners, and customers.According to Gartner, the market demand for app development will grow at least five times faster than IT's capacity to deliver it through to 2021.Utilities seem an unlikely candidate for change or disruption from the norm, especially given that it has been one of the most stable of industries since the Thomas Edison-era power stations and today.

That said, utility companies are looking for ways to mobilize and automate their complex operational workflow and the industry is seeing the benefits of mobile applications as the catalyst for transforming their operations.

However, to successfully deploy fully developed apps companies should have an in-house technical team, complete with developers/coders, but, in absence of them, companies will need to outsource for them.

These apps can be delivered in less time and are compatible across multiple channels and devices.

This is a cost-effective substitute for outsourcing resources and enables businesses to keep up with the demands for digital innovation.Innovapptive Leads with RACE™ App BuilderInnovapptive offers a Zero code/No-code app development solution, RACE™ App Builder (RAB), that enables organizations to build business applications quicker than traditional custom-built solutions.

To free up cash, companies look at inventory optimization solutions.

Optimizing inventory is critical to success for companies of all sizes.Inventory optimization and working capital are priorities in the mining industry.

During times of economic downturn, like recently, the mining industry supply chain is more a warehouse of spare parts due to all that they have on hand for maintenance and repair for remote locations.Efficient inventory management is critical for a company’s success.

Manual processes significantly increase data entry mistakes resulting in substandard inventory levels and dissatisfied customers.

Implementing a fully automated ERP system with accurate inventory management capabilities is the best answer for the companies reliant on manual processes.Inventory takes an enormous amount of initial cash to achieve optimal supply/demand levels.

At the same time, accurately predicting customer demand is no easy task.