Comments on: Primerica Deploys 4,000 Palm Devices

Palm announced today the deployment of 4,000 Palm handheld and smarphone devices to Primerica Financial Services, a subsidiary of Citigroup, Inc. Primerica is running its own customized application on the devices, called Turbo Apps, allowing its mobile workforce to complete financial applications in the comfort of their customer's homes.

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Their more efficient

palmdoc88 @ 8/30/2005 6:11:36 PM #

1st post ;)
As an owner of both Palm(T3 and T5) and PPC devices(Dell Axim x50v) I find myself resorting to Palm for daily work. Its just so much faster and more efficient.
The corporate world and Palm need to work more together like this example. Well done Palm!

T3 & T5 user

RE: Their more efficient

KultiVator @ 8/30/2005 6:23:59 PM #

You got it in a nutshell. Palm simplicity makes me smile, especially after some horendous experiences I had trying to help a colleague with their shiny new HP.

A nice positive story and so far it's troll-free!

RE: Their more efficient

SeldomVisitor @ 8/31/2005 5:52:17 AM #

Out of those "4000 Palm devices" that are supposedly a mix of PDAs and smartphones, I sure would have liked to see that mix broken down into how MANY PDAs and how many of what type of "smartphone", wouldn't you?

RE: They're more efficient

ChiA @ 8/31/2005 10:52:11 AM #

I sure would have liked to see that mix broken down into how MANY PDAs and how many of what type of "smartphone", wouldn't you?

Yes, I did find it a touch odd that Palm mentioned the internal custom App being used by the finance company but not the models of handhelds/smartphones sold, especially when they've done so with similar press releases in the past.

For all we know they could've have sold 2 Treo 600s and 3,998 Zires to get rid of discontinued stock! Jibing aside, what matters is whether the Palms make it easier for the company to conduct their business and Palm is adequately paid for what they've provided, so hopefully everyone walks away happy.

"What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight but the size of the fight in the dog" - Dwight D. Eisenhower

RE: Their more efficient

SeldomVisitor @ 8/31/2005 11:40:47 AM #

The PALM-pessimist in me says they did not name names for a reason.

1 Treo 600 + 3999 Palm m100 = 4000

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 8/31/2005 11:54:20 AM #

Keep it quiet.

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Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.
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The Palm eCONomy = Communism™
The Great Palm Swindle: http://www.palminfocenter.com/comment_view.asp?ID=7864#108038

RE: Their more efficient

timepilot84 @ 9/4/2005 6:36:02 AM #

I have a LD and an Axim x50v and after 3 months of having both devices, I find that I use the x50v for browsing the web and the LD for everything else. I'm going to hang on to the X50v at least until WM2005 comes out, but I might just ditch it after that if it doesn't shine.

Simple and Easy-To-Use

vesther @ 8/30/2005 7:04:22 PM #

Judging from how Primerica deploy its Palm-branded devices, all I only can say is that Palm is generally committed to the simplicity and ease-of-use. While they are NOT that perfect, I think that the simplicity part saves them.

Powered by Palm OS since March 2002

But PPC seems much more popular for enterprise deployments

asiayeah @ 8/31/2005 10:52:12 AM #

While some enterprise deployments of Palm devices come out from time to time, it looks to me that there are actually more PPC deployments for enterprises. Is it just my observation?

--
With great power comes great responsiblity.

RE: But PPC seems much more popular for enterprise deployments

InsGuy @ 8/31/2005 12:07:57 PM #

It is more popular. It's not necessarily easier to use, but like you said, for enterprise deployments, it is more popular.

I wonder what specific app they are using, that would seem to work well on both a pda AND a smartphone? An app that runs great on the Lifedrive, for example, would look somewhat different on a Treo, wouldn't it? (Assuming the app for the LD took full advantage of the screen).

Just curious.

All good things...

It's ironic you raise this issue because...

ChiA @ 8/31/2005 12:53:44 PM #

...when you Google Primerica and TurboApps you get this article:

www.appforge.com/corp/press/2004/030404-primerica.pdf

and to quote:
Swift and his team have developed an application for capturing and submitting life insurance applications on hand-held mobile devices. The application called TurboApps, developed using Microsoft (Redmond, Wash.) VisualBasic and AppForge (Atlanta) MobileVB tools, will run on standard hand-held devices using the Palm and Pocket PC operating systems. "While our first implementation will be with the Palm OS," says Swift, "it was important to us that we could use the same set of source code for multiple operating systems."
Tom Swift, senior VP of field technology with Primerica Life
Insurance.

So Primerica is hedging its bets on the Palm vs PocketPC debate (as it's wise to do). It's a good sign they've gone for Palm hardware and PalmOS this time but there's the possibility they'll change their mind in the future.

"What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight but the size of the fight in the dog" - Dwight D. Eisenhower