ROI to us is more than just money. It s also customer happiness.

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1 Mitsubishi Electric projects a $30 million increase in sales with just one enterprise mobile app Mitsubishi Electric builds a suite of enterprise and consumer apps on Appcelerator Titanium to improve its multi-step distribution system IMPRESSIVE ROI Mitubishi Electronic reports a 100% increase in productivity from registered contractors since the introduction of its app suite. Just looking at the meview AR product visualization app, we have 500 plus sales people actively engaged, says Gabriel Weiss, head of the Interactive Marketing Technologies Group, Mitsubishi Electric Cooling & Heating. If each one of those contractors sells one more system a month - and they are - we re projecting a multi-million dollar increase in sales, roughly $30 million this year, with just one enterprise app. At the same time, Mitsubishi Electric Cooling & Heating group estimates savings from decreased printing and catalog distribution in the millions of dollars. Contractors are also reporting increased satisfaction. ROI to us is more than just money, Weiss adds, It s also customer happiness. With our apps we ve been able to show the homeowner what a unit looks like, to which they ve been able to say, I don t like it there. Move it. If we can avoid drilling in the wall, mounting the system, and the customer deciding they don t like where we put it, that s fantastic advantage over our competitors. ROI to us is more than just money. It s also customer happiness. HEAD OF INTERACTIVE MARKETING TECHNOLOGIES GROUP, MISTUBISHI ELECTRIC COOLING & HEATING COMPANY Mitsubishi Electric Cooling & Heating manufactures and sells the leading brand of ductless cooling and heating technology in the United States. BENEFITS OF MOBILE APPS Impressive ROI: projected $30 million increase in sales on one enterprise app Timely information: No delay in disseminating latest product info and prices, leading to improved brand management Push notification: Informs sales teams there are updates to check for Differentiation: Uses different apps to address different kinds of communication Adaptability: Versions of specific apps tailored to different channel levels Cost savings: Multi-million dollar reduction in annual printing and distribution costs BENEFITS OF APPCELERATOR TITANIUM Familiarity: Titanium was already popular with third-party developers Speed: Prototyping and update times of a week or less Flexibility: Potential for easy expansion to Android and other platforms Ease of use: When it came to developing apps in-house, ME s Java-savvy web teams were ready to go APPLICATIONS A suite of mobile apps, initially for ios devices, that direct sets of internal data and content out to the right people in a complex sales channel. Initial release: menews for ipad medocs for ipad In development: mequote for ipad, mescreen for ipad mepresent for ipad OBJECTIVE Communicate clearly and quickly with customers across the company s multi-step distribution model, allow for timely and constructive feedback, increase customer satisfaction and sales opportunities.

2 WHY TITANIUM Choosing to build on the Appcelerator Titanium platform was straightforward, says Weiss. When we started out we relied heavily on the developer input and what they felt was the best solution for the application and, to be honest, most every one of them asked if they could use Titanium, he reports. Fast builds and turnarounds In the past, it took months to prototype and iterate an app. Using Titanium, typical time-to-prototype has been around one week, reports Weiss, as have modifications between versions. Indeed, he says, With Titanium, the prototyping is the quickest part of the process for any of our apps. Easy integration with existing data Titanium made it easy to connect menews, for example, to the company s existing RSS news feed. And in building medocs, it offered simple integration into Mitsubishi Electric data servers with weblike search and document recovery, and additional features such as storage of favorites for ongoing reference and ing of direct server links to documents instead of sending the full PDF files via from the mobile devices. That experience persuaded Weiss to stick with Titanium now that he s begun to develop his own apps in house. Because of the success of those first apps, he says, and the ease of modification after the release, we didn t change. Once something works for me, I tend to stick with it. We selected Appcelerator Titanium because it allowed us to quickly and costeffectively build native apps for multiple devices and platforms in a language that all our developers are familiar with. Each of our developers evaluated other products, but nothing came close it was a unanimous decision. HEAD OF INTERACTIVE MARKETING TECHNOLOGIES GROUP, MISTUBISHI ELECTRIC COOLING & HEATING

3 ABOUT MITSUBISHI ELECTRIC Mitsubishi Electric s North American HVAC (Mitsubishi Electric Cooling & Heating) division manufactures the country s leading brand of ductless cooling and heating technology. Ductless systems represent one of the fastest growing segments of the American air-conditioning and heating (HVAC) market. In the US, Mitsubishi Electric employs a multi-step distribution model, selling to distributors in 1,500 locations. These distributors supply over 25,000 local HVAC contractors, who in turn sell on to home and business end consumers. Communicating appropriately with each group within the channel is a tough challenge but one that mobile apps are making it easier to overcome. The company currently has two Titanium-based apps up and running, and at least three more in development. They are already positively impacting Mitsubishi Electric s bottom line. I got introduced to the Titanium platform through menews and medocs and because of the success of those apps, and the ease of modification after the release we didn t change. Once something works for me, I stick to it. HEAD OF INTERACTIVE MARKETING TECHNOLOGIES GROUP, MISTUBISHI ELECTRIC COOLING & HEATING THE CHALLENGE: ACCURATE INFORMATION, EFFICIENTLY DELIVERED ACROSS THE CHANNEL Prior to creating its suite of mobile communication tools, Mitsubishi Electric was facing a number of issues: Poor communication per marketing dollar Mitsubishi Electric felt it should add online assets like PDFs and videos, and services such as notifications to its existing print materials and in-person training. But customers down the channel were often left both confused and overloaded, and regularly dismissed vital communications as spam. Outdated, inaccurate materials Too often, the technical and pricing details in customer hands were either outdated or inaccurate, negatively impacting Mitsubishi Electric s brand image. High print costs Mitsubishi Electric produces multiple print brochures and catalogs, several over a hundred and fifty pages thick. These are expensive to print and distribute, and at the same time difficult to update and cumbersome for contractors to carry in the field.

4 Lack of feedback Mitsubishi Electric wanted a better way to gather responses about its marketing efforts from its various customers, but had no easy way to tease out its interactions with its various constituents. We wanted to quickly and easily disseminate specific subsets of information to each one of the groups within our sales channels, says Weiss, and we wanted them to be able to send it along down the line and give us feedback. That s really where our mobile communication strategy came from. THE SOLUTION: A SUITE OF MOBILE APPS In 2011, Weiss s group began creating a suit of apps to fulfill their needs. Working initially with contracted developers, they ve built the majority of their apps on Appcelerator s Titanium platform. The apps let Mitsubishi Electric take centrally-held assets such as product manuals, pricing data, and branded videos, and distribute them to specific constituencies within the channel. The first two Titanium-based apps were all enterprise-directed. menews timely, differentiated news for the channel Flows news and information (announcements, press releases, pricing structures) from Mitsubishi Electric out into the sales channel. It was built in three versions differentiated for three different levels of channel partner (internal sales team, distributor sales, hvac contractors) each with a push-notification system for new articles. medocs up-to-date technical docs and videos Offers all sales channel members the latest Mitsubishi Electric technical and operational product documentation and marketing materials (reducing demand for print catalogs and specs), along with a push-notify service informing them of updates, new product lines etc. The team have a variety of additional apps currently in development: mequote Custom contractor estimates An enterprise app that lets contractors create custom estimates in the field. They can choose a system, select extra parts, add their overhead for installation and generate a letterhead PDF estimate to share directly with the homeowner, confident that their product information and pricing is up to date in a customizable, fully self-branded, environment. mescreen A branded video player for contractors Created in-house, this app underpins a branded video player via which contractors can show off any current Mitsubishi Electric product to potential buyers. Instead of expecting consumers to navigate a YouTube channel, the app offers a clearly categorized path though Mitsubishi Electric s product listings, and pushes new videos out as they become available. mepresent Customizable and controlled in-home presentation for contractors Focusing on providing the contractors a means to add their company specific content into template driven online environment with transfer to the ipad app. All Mitsubishi Electric product and technology information is controlled and maintained via cloud-based updates from Mitsubishi Electric. This gives

5 the presenter a consistent and company specific look while Mitsubishi Electric controls all of the proprietary product data. THE FUTURE A MOBILE ECOSYSTEM Mitsubishi Electric plans to keep expanding its suite of apps, most of which it now offers via a private app store called mesync. It s likely that several existing and future apps will be ported to Android and other popular platforms. Building on device-agnostic Titanium, makes that a relatively simple move. Another reason why we ve wanted to stay with Titanium, Weiss explains, is that once we ve developed as much as we can for ios, we can easily switch over and start pushing out to the Android side of things. Then with our entrerprise-centric mesync app store I can easily control which customer gets which version of the app suites to choose from on any platform. Setting Mitsubishi Electric Cooling & Heating apart from all of our competitors. This is all about creating a communication platform that provide our sales channels with the tools they need to be successful. Individual distributors and contractors might not need every app we re developing, but we re allowing them to pick and choose the apps that will make a difference, depending upon their needs. HEAD OF INTERACTIVE MARKETING TECHNOLOGIES GROUP, MISTUBISHI ELECTRIC COOLING & HEATING Appcelerator is the #1 Mobile Cloud Platform Appcelerator is the leading enterprise-grade, cross-device mobile development solution on the market today. With over 380,000 mobile app developers worldwide and 50,000+ cloud-connected mobile, desktop and web apps in the wild, Appcelerator is the largest publisher of applications in the iphone App Store. The company s flagship offering, Appcelerator Titanium, is the only platform to enable fully native, cross-device development from a single codebase for ios, Android, and Blackberry. Appcelerator s customers include NBC, PayPal, ebay, Orange, and Cisco. These companies develop their mobile applications on Appcelerator products so they can decrease time-to-market and development costs, increase customer adoption and revenues, and enjoy greater flexibility and control. Download Titanium for free at CORPORATE HEADQUARTERS 440 Bernardo Ave, Mountain View, CA CONTACT US Phone: (877) General info: info@appcelerator.com Sales inquiries: sales@appcelerator.com