Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 15, 1995 TAG: 9510130087
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: F-2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press|
DATELINE: FAIRFAX LENGTH: Medium
Designer: Computer Products & Services Inc. of Fairfax.
Primary market: Police, firefighters, mechanics and other blue-collar workers who need instant access to volumes of information while leaving their hands free for working.
It's called the Mobile Assistant, and its users sport a futuristic if somewhat nerdy Robocop look.
But tiny CPSI is betting millions of dollars that its ``wearable'' voice-controlled computer will find a place in the fast-growing portable computing market.
The machines cost $10,000 to $17,000 apiece - a price CPSI officials believe customers will be willing to pay for the convenience of hands-free computing.
Consider an airline mechanic fixing a complex electrical system. Typically, the worker must refer to large stacks of manuals. With the wearable computer, a worker would give voice commands to get troves of digitalized information, which he could see on the eyepiece while continuing with hands-on repairs.
``I think a lot of people are convinced that the new paradigm is true portability,'' said CPSI chief executive Ed Newman. ``The future is about equal-opportunity computing that anyone can use anywhere.''
Newman and two others patented the Mobile Assistant last year after six years of development. Much of his company's consulting profits are being sunk into development of the device, which so far has been sold only in small quantities for evaluation and testing.
The basic technology is much like that of a desktop computer. On the belt is an IBM-compatible computer using a 486 microprocessor and a 540-megabyte hard drive, 16 megabytes of random access memory, a small mouse control and voice-recognition software.
The 3-pound device can run several hours on a lithium ion battery. It can run Microsoft Corp.'s Windows software, as well as DOS and Unix programs.
The first units were targeted at the military. The Army is testing a few units to see if they help technicians fix Apache helicopters. More recent customers are power companies, airlines and other maintenance-oriented businesses.
Newman said distribution could pick up as the device's cost and weight decrease and its computing might increases.
``The next versions will be one-third less expensive, one-third less heavy and twice as powerful,'' he said.
Portable computing analysts are mixed on the product's potential.
``If it can further give the user the opportunity to take it wherever he wants to go, then it has a definite market,'' said Bill Karow, senior analyst at Workgroup Strategies Inc., a research firm in Portsmouth, N.H.
But John Robb of Cambridge, Mass.-based Forrester Research Inc. thinks a device such as the Mobile Assistant has a limited market.
``I think it's a super-small niche,'' he said.
by CNB