Telecom Lead Europe: London’s estate agent Foxtons has selected Nokia Lumia 820 as its business smartphone.
The estate agent has already deployed around 900 Lumia smartphones to its employees.
The company has 35 offices throughout London and two in Surrey.
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Foxtons switched to Nokia Lumia due to its integration with the company’s existing Microsoft infrastructure. Foxtons uses Microsoft Outlook to ensure that employees are armed with property information for each calendar appointment.
Between viewings, agents can check emails, make targeted calls and prepare for their next appointment, maximising their time out of the office and keeping them one step ahead of the competition. The built-in Microsoft Office applications on Windows Phone 8 enables them to work on Excel spreadsheets and edit Word documents whilst away from their office PCs.
Dan Rafferty, IT director of Foxtons, says it developed an app integrating personnel system with active directory and phone system in order to access accurate information directly from agents’ Nokia Lumia 820s.
Nokia Lumia 820’s mobile navigation features were also useful. Nokia Drive offers free turn-by-turn navigation with live traffic updates and offline maps, removing the need for separate satnavs or an A-Z.
When showing prospective clients around a property, agents can use Nokia City Lens to show live information on the local area, showcasing points of interest and amenities including leisure centres, cinemas, restaurants and shops. Foxtons agents can now have everything they need to know about the area in the palm of their hand.
“Foxtons is an example of how a company can empower its workforce to work effectively on the move, with their smartphones integrated with its existing Microsoft infrastructure,” said Adrian Williams, director of Business Sales UK at Nokia.
Smartphone majors — Apple, Samsung, Nokia, etc. — are giving tough competition to BlackBerry.
Recently, the U.S. Defense Department announced that it is opening its exclusive contract with BlackBerry to other device makers, including Apple and Google.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency had also dropped its BlackBerry devices and replaced them with Apple’s iPhone.
