REDMOND, Wash., Oct. 13, 1997 — Microsoft® Windows® CE operating system-based Handheld PCs (H/PCs) are working their way into more and more corporations as the devices continue to increase productivity and improve communication for mobile professionals. Organizations such as Dow Jones Markets; Goldman, Sachs & Co.; Hoechst Marion Roussel; NASA; the Seattle Mariners; the University of Mississippi; and the U.S. Marine Corps have made commitments to the H/PC as part of the Windows CE Early Adopter Program, demonstrating interest in H/PCs as a serious business tool and a platform for vital, enterprisewide applications.
“We’re excited to have such a diverse group of organizations developing unique applications for Windows CE 2.0 for the Handheld PC,”
said Harel Kodesh, general manager, consumer appliance group at Microsoft Corp.
“By using H/PCs, these organizations have an opportunity to make a substantial difference in the way they do business.”
Dow Jones Markets is a leading global provider of news and market information, decision-support applications, trading-room systems and transaction services for financial institutions. Dow Jones Markets believes that H/PCs can provide an important and highly useful service to its customers. The company plans to use the power of Windows CE to deliver mobile information services displayed on H/PCs.
Exchanging information quickly and accurately is part of the day-to-day business at Goldman, Sachs & Co., a leading international investment banking and securities firm with headquarters in New York City. The New York Stock Exchange currently trades nearly 600 million shares daily. Goldman, Sachs & Co. plans to help increase its market share in a business that may someday soon be at a billion shares a day by automating and improving its communications processes by accessing the exchange’s advanced wireless network.
“We plan to automate this part of the trading process by providing our brokers with a custom application that runs on H/PCs equipped with wireless modems,”
said John Hewitt, vice president of equities for Goldman, Sachs & Co.
“We expect H/PCs to make a dramatic difference in the way we do business and to significantly enhance our client service by allowing our brokers to electronically exchange important information.”
Hoechst Marion Roussel, a $13 billion global pharmaceutical organization with North American headquarters in Kansas City, Mo., has always provided its sales force with the most efficient productivity tools available. This year, the company equipped its sales representatives in the United States with H/PCs running their new sales automation application.
“We rewrote our laptop-based Technology Information Management (TIM) application for the H/PC, giving our sales reps the ability to quickly and easily capture electronic signatures from physicians and exchange customer and sales information with our headquarters,”
said Kevin Greenlee, manager of applications for Hoechst Marion Roussel.
”
This system is currently in a pilot stage, with rollout planned for January 1998, and we project that by moving this application to H/PCs, we could save more than
$5 million annually.”
The National Aeronautical and Space Administration (NASA) typically is associated with high-profile missions such as those of the space shuttle, the Hubble space telescope and, most recently, the Mars Pathfinder. While considerable resources go into those projects, NASA also spearheads dozens of scientific research projects that focus on more earthly subjects.
To explore new ways to increase efficiency in all these areas, the NASA/Marshall Space Flight Center is providing its research scientists with H/PCs to help them manage their schedules and projects and stay in touch with hundreds of colleagues around the world. NASA also plans to work with Microsoft to build a custom, real-time project-tracking application that runs on H/PCs, providing scientists with a round-the-clock status of their research projects.
Scouts for the Seattle Mariners needed a more efficient way to gather statistics on the more than 1,500 amateur baseball players they observe each year. To accomplish this, the team equipped several of its scouts with H/PCs running a suite of custom Windows CE-based applications. Instead of having to hand-write notes on a piece of paper and then retype them into a computer, now the scouts can jot down notes once, right on their H/PCs. Back at the office or hotel, they can automatically synchronize all the information with their desktop PCs. Because they are palm-size, H/PCs also provide the scouts with extra security, preventing competing scouts from getting an over-the-shoulder, unauthorized preview of the Mariners’ scouting secrets as the team recruits players for the 1998 draft.
Dr. Robert Cook, professor of computer science at the University of Mississippi, sees H/PCs as the enabling technology heralding a dramatic paradigm shift in computer-assisted education. Last year, Cook created a portable lab-in-a-box of 25 H/PCs as part of his National Classroom Project. With it, the laboratory can be brought right into the classroom instead of sending the class to the lab. The project uses wireless modems from Proxim to provide Internet connectivity. So far, Cook has used the H/PC lab for research projects and undergraduate and graduate computer science classes, and has even provided H/PC workshops for children in the community.
In the U.S. Marine Corps, where mobility and efficiency are crucial, H/PCs are being evaluated for meeting small-unit tactical requirements. The U.S. Marine Corps has built a prototype command-and-control application for H/PCs that provides situational awareness, a digital map and land navigation functionality for small-unit leaders. The charter of the Small Unit Operations program is to provide a situational awareness system that significantly improves the capabilities of soldiers and Marines to shoot, move, communicate and survive.
H/PCs and Windows CE
H/PCs running Windows CE are the best mobile companion devices for Microsoft Windows-based PCs. Windows CE is Microsoft’s operating system platform designed for a broad range of consumer devices for communications, embedded systems, entertainment and mobile computing.
Founded in 1975, Microsoft (NASDAQ
“MSFT”
) is the worldwide leader in software for personal computers. The company offers a wide range of products and services for business and personal use, each designed with the mission of making it easier and more enjoyable for people to take advantage of the full power of personal computing every day.
Microsoft and Windows are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.
Other product and company names herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.
Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/ on Microsoft’s corporate information pages.
