Workers Use Cell Phones to Submit Data

Jeff Bonar holds his Blackberry, for which he has designed software to fit the needs of any company, in Doral, Fla., Wednesday, May 16, 2007. (AP Photo/Lynne Sladky) (Lynne Sladky - AP)

MIAMI -- When maintenance workers finish a job at an Indianapolis university, they don't return to the office to fill out paperwork and pick up their next assignment. They grab their cell phones.

By punching a few buttons, they submit forms, calculate the time spent on the project and see where the next task awaits them at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis.

Paperless data exchange between field workers and their offices is not new. But Florida startup JumpStart Wireless is bringing it to regular cell phones with software that bridges incompatibilities among handsets.

Using artificial intelligence, the Delray Beach-based company's application fits most business software, and works with nearly every cell phone brand. Users like the Indianapolis university say it saves time and money on paperwork, data entry, labor costs and auditing.

"Any phone you can play a game on, you can run our software on," said Jeff Bonar, who started JumpStart in 2000.

Bonar used his doctorate in artificial intelligence from the University of Massachusetts and a $500,000 initial investment to found JumpStart. His goal was to come up with ways to move corporate data using gadgets such as cell phones or BlackBerry e-mail devices.

"One of the problems in the wireless world for business software is that everything is incompatible," Bonar said. "At no point in the future will Motorola phones be compatible with Nokia phones."

For Bonar, writing custom software for each company was not an option because there are simply too many business programs to work with. That's where artificial intelligence comes in.

"We let the computer itself configure the software to meet the needs of a particular customer," Bonar said.

Companies customize forms that organize the information they want sent to a field worker. Data bounce from the office to JumpStart's servers to the worker's phone and back.

It helps eliminate paperwork and reduces the need for employees to perform data entry for client billing and in-house accounting. It can help speed up billing and track staff productivity.

Bonar said the typical customer pays about $35 per user, per month. JumpStart is currently processing more than 350,000 transactions per month. He declined to discuss specifics about the company's financials, only saying it should turn a profit this year.