Ruggedized Mobile Computers Growing Popularity in Spite of Higher Price Levels

EVERETT, WA — February 10, 2010 — Intermec Technologies (NYSE: IN) today announced a partnership with HealthWyse and Data Capture Solutions to provide mobile healthcare professionals with access to electronic medical records. Intermec offers the CN3, a ruggedized handheld computer. Healthwyse is a home health care software developer and Data Capture Solutions is a support organization.

Caritas Home Care, a longtime HealthWyse user based in Massachusetts, recently installed the joint solution. Agency IT managers wanted to replace their consumer-grade PDAs that were experiencing a high failure frequency under daily use. PDA failures increased hardware costs and reduced mobile clinicians' productivity by forcing a resort to paper, followed by a drive to the office to get a replacement device, and then re-entry of notes into the new device.

According to VDC Research, average annual failure rates for non-ruggedized handheld computers are 38 percent, compared to just 11 percent for ruggedized models.

Data Capture Solutions, an Intermec Premier value-added reseller, provides helpdesk, software staging, cellular network activation and hot swap repair to provide Caritas with the lowest possible cost of ownership. Before selecting the Intermec CN3, Caritas ran a lengthy field-test of various mobile devices. The rugged mobile handheld's Wi-Fi(R), Bluetooth(R) and WAN (3G CDMA/EV-DO or GSM/EDGE) radios provide mobile clinicians with immediate access to the HealthWyse electronic medical record.

"The consumer devices we had just couldn't handle the intensity of the work environment. The amount of malfunctions we experienced substantially impacted productivity, morale and hardware costs," said Mark Jozwicki, IT manager at Caritas Home Care. "The CN3 has positively impacted our business operations and patient care."

Caritas also plans to leverage the CN3's integrated video and still camera to capture and wirelessly transmit images and stream video to remote specialists who can make course-of-treatment recommendations to the on-site mobile clinician in real-time. Agency administrators project they will achieve full ROI in less than one year, due to clinician time savings, improved productivity and reduced maintenance, support and spare device costs.

More about the Caritas instillation can be found at http://www.intermec.com/learning/content_library/case_studies/csCaritas.aspx.