Telecoms providers: What’s new in business smartphone technology?

If you think your business smartphone is smart today, just wait until tomorrow. Below is an overview of some of the improvements and new technologies on the horizon:

• Hardware: Businesses are seeing the potential to incorporate portable tablets, touch-screen panels and Web-connected TVs into their networks. In fact, tablets and smartphones are increasingly morphing into total smart devices, offering the benefits of both in a single package.
• Apps: The business app industry is growing and one evolution is the arrival of apps specifically tailored to particular companies or industries. It is also becoming increasingly important for businesses to design their own apps which can be used for marketing, generating revenue, offering discounts and promoting customer loyalty.
• Voice recognition: Since Apple released Siri as a voice-activated personal assistant, other manufacturers have been clamoring to get their products on the market, and they are becoming ever more sophisticated and accurate.
• Social media: This domain is spurred on by the launch of Facebook’s messenger app which facilitates voice calls.
• Near Field Communication (NFC): Already a feature on some mobile phones and set to become far more prevalent, NFC enables users to swipe their phones over a reader to make purchases, unlock car and hotel room doors and access live travel information.
• Communicating with your car:  Thanks to new synching technology your car will soon be able to run diagnostic tests and remind you that it needs fuel. You can control your car with just with your voice, through your phone.  You will even be able to recharge your smartphone battery from your car, and Wi-Fi for cars (making vehicles moving hotspots) is being rolled out.
• Handwriting recognition: Also could be just around the corner on new handsets.
• Retina scans: Using the smartphone’s built-in camera, which could be used for door entry security and secure shopping, looks set to become reality.
• Heartbeat tracking: Used for health reasons as well as matching music to your mood.
• The Internet of Things: Set to become big news and one way it could revolutionize operations is by linking smartphones to all manner of appliances, cars and buildings for maximum remote control.

What this means for your business

This is all great news for business mobile phone users. Mobile technology is becoming increasingly affordable and smartphones are becoming the “new normal” (over half the UK population has a smartphone). So not only is this the perfect time to invest in forward-thinking technology for your business, the improvements will just continue to make it easier to run your business in the future.