Today’s Impact of Ubiquitous Computing on Business Processes

The aim of this paper is to show the impact of currently available ubiquitous computing technology on business processes. It shortly describes and investigates technologies, its drivers, and gives some examples of their application. This includes technologies like automatic identification, localization, and sensor technology that seem to have a strong impact on business processes. Building on these key technologies in ubiquitous computing, their impact on business processes is investigated. Firstly, business problems are stated, where the utilization of ubiquitous computing technology might provide a solution. Then, three application cases are presented to show the needs that drive the adoption of these technologies and to show how business processes are affected. A ubiquitous computing process model is proposed that is derived from the collection of cases. This model helps to identify application potentials for ubicomp computing technologies in a business environment. The paper closes with some future perspectives on ubiquitous computing applications.