Good things in small packages.

• Author: Garner, Gary R.
• Position: Pocket-intelligence devices - Includes related article - The CFO's Guide to Information Management: Pocket Technology

Pocket-intelligence devices are more than mere playthings. They're powerful tools for enhancing your company's strategic and organizational capabilities.

At 8:30 a.m., an American businessman gets into a taxi and is on his way to Washington National Airport to fly to New York for a major business presentation. On the way to the airport he reviews key business data on his pocket digital assistant, or PDA, and discovers that two key graphs need revisions and should be included in the client's material. Also, one important data sheet is missing from his presentation material. A quick call to the office on his pocket cellular phone alerts his team to the needed changes and missing material.

At the airport he receives a call from the office on his cellular phone, which has a virtual display that portrays information much like a full-size computer screen. He reviews the new graphs and data sheet and asks his staff to electronically mail the final copies to him at New York's LaGuardia Airport's electronic business center. He continues on to the boarding area and inserts his smart card into a smart-card reader at the gate, which instantly verifies his identity with a picture for the gate attendant on a small discreet screen. The ticket information and seat assignment are downloaded into the airline's host computer and he boards the aircraft.

On arrival at LaGuardia, he goes to the airport's electronic business center and inserts his smart card, which is encrypted for secure E-mail pickup. The data is downloaded into the smart card. The businessman inserts the smart card into the center's multicolor copier, where a push of the button downloads the smart-card information. In a few minutes the copier prints the revised presentation material. He places the smart card back in his shirt pocket and calls a taxi to take him to his business meeting, confident that he is fully prepared for an outstanding presentation. On the way, he calls the office on his pocket cellular phone to thank his team for a job well-done....

Tomorrow's portable technologies are here today. And the market for pocket intelligence is ready. Pocket-intelligence products will be to the 1990s what personal computers were to the 1980s. The emergence of pocket intelligence will cause a major shift in technologies, applications, infrastructure and users' needs, both domestically and globally.

Recent advances in micro-electronics, mobile communications, human-machine interfaces and software technologies have enabled progressive businesses to build a new class of small information systems and components with powerful capabilities. The advances also allow farsighted end-users to use this new class of micro-information systems and emerging applications in planning strategic organizational improvements.

These small components, known as pocket-intelligence devices, range in size from a coin to a credit card to a hand-held computer. They perform as portable data carriers, specialized application processors, sophisticated computers, communication terminals and consumer products. The application opportunities for pocket-intelligence devices are growing rapidly in the...