In addition to purchasing 35 new Good devices, which brought the total number of wireless handhelds deployed in the organization to 70, Bechtel loaded Good’s GoodLink and GoodInfo software onto two different servers. The GoodLink software lets handhelds communicate with the company’s Microsoft Exchange server. GoodLink takes all the e-mail, contact and calendar information in Exchange, converts it to a format suitable for a RIM or Good device, encrypts it using Verisign’s triple DES (data encryption standard; a popular symmetric-key encryption method) and pushes it outside the Bechtel firewall and over Cingular Wireless’s Mobitext network.

Meanwhile, GoodInfo performs database queries on a variety of back-end systems, including proprietary databases, an ERP system, and a Salesforce.com or Siebel CRM system. For example, if a user wants to find out if any of his colleagues are meeting with ExxonMobil or if he needs information on tax policies, contracts with banks or experiences with lenders, GoodInfo connects to the necessary data sources and returns the results to the user via wireless e-mail within minutes.

Hernandez says it took just three hours to get the GoodLink server up and running and about five hours to both put the GoodInfo server online and wirelessly enable three corporate applications—ExpertLink (the resource management application), BDTools (the market intelligence application) and BETR (Bechtel Enterprises’ time recording application). (Hernandez admits that the deployment was so quick partly because the applications were already Web-enabled. Had he needed to put a browser-interface on those apps, the implementation would have taken much longer.)

Hernandez won’t disclose the cost of the hardware, software and wireless service he purchased from Good, noting only that he spent $10,000 in consulting fees. But a company that buys low-end server software from Good and rolls out 70 devices can expect to make an initial investment of less than $20,000 (based on the $349 cost of each handheld device and the GoodLink server that starts at $2,000) plus $35 per user per month for a basic wireless service package and other fees, according to Good.

Hernandez, who is participating in an early-adopters program with Good, is currently in the process of deciding, with users’ input, which other corporate applications should next be made available via the wireless network. He wants to roll out more devices to the 250 employees who work for Bechtel Enterprises. In fact, he says, if he gets his way, everyone in the organization will have one.

The Benefits

In 2002, Bechtel Group managed to increase the amount of new business it booked from $9.3 billion in 2001 to $12.7 billion in 2002 for a net increase of $3.4 billion. Hernandez won’t credit any of that increase to wireless technology. He will, however, point to cost savings. By deploying Good’s technology, Hernandez was able to disconnect the RAS server, saving his company about $30,000 a month on remote connectivity. He says the difference between what he was paying for the RAS server and what he’s paying for Good is about $25,000 a month.