Mo’s Mobile has gone Google

update At a press conference held today at its Sydney headquarters, search giant Google revealed Mo’s Mobile was the Australian mobile retailer which has adopted its Apps collaboration platform.

Founded in 2005 with offices in Sydney and Melbourne, Mo’s Mobile has 94 outlets across the country and employs over 120 staff. Mo’s Mobile owner Tim Levy today said its company has adopted Google Apps collaboration platform for the past two years without experiencing any downtime. The deployment had been kept secret and revealed today only.

Levy said companies like Google enabled business owners to access the functionality of the cloud environment, adding the whole Google experience had been “amazing”. He said he chose Google because it offered ease of use, control, reliability, technical support and functionality at a reduced cost. However, Levy noted ease of use was not a key driver of the deployment at the beginning.

“Microsoft Office in terms of ease of use was probably ahead when we chose Google, but the functionality of the Google platform was beyond that,” he said, noting that Mo’s employees were more familiar with Microsoft Office. “But it’s getting easier and easier (to use) everyday.”

Levy said he was satisfied with the deployment of Google Apps as it was fast and didn’t require technical help to be built. He said the new system was built in two days and rolled out in a week without incurring in extra expenses to train the staff, who accessed online videos to learn how to use the new facilities.

Moreover he said its company has been well supported when facing some “minor issues” by the Mojo support desk, a third-party application for Google Apps which costs Levy $200 a month. “It’s amazing,” Levy said. “I don’t even need any IT people to build this stuff. It’s already there.”

He said the adoption of the Apps platform improved his company’s retail execution by 30 per cent, enhancing collaboration across team members and overall efficiency. Moreover he said Google’s Marketplace offered owners the power to select the applications they need to run their businesses. In the case of Mo’s Mobile, Levy said the most convenient apps were Mojo Helpdesk and Form Assembly.

Google Enterprise product manager Anil Sabharwal said organisations with 50 employees or fewer could access the Apps platform for free but without technical support; While larger companies, with more than 50 employs, needed to pay a yearly $50 per user free in order to receive support 24/7.

Google’s announcement today came months after the company revealed Flight Centre and Ray White had both “gone Google”. Mo’s Mobile is a company with geographically dispersed workers and Levy said the actual structure of the company might have eased the adoption of the Apps platform. “We started virtually, so it was probably easier for us,” he said.

Image credit: Google