Resources – References

Digitization in public administration: City of Erkelenz

Everphone equips staff at the Erkelenz municipal administration with smartphones and tablets on demand. Learn more about Device-as-a-Service in practice in public administrations.

About the city of Erkelenz

Erkelenz is the largest city in the region of Heinsberg (in North Rhine-Westphalia) and has a population of approximately 46,000. The city of Erkelenz offers citizens a wide range of public administration services, from citizen services and building authorities to social welfare and youth services.

Challenges

The city of Erkelenz faces continual challenges related to digitalization. The need to flexibly equip staff with mobile devices has become ever-more pressing, because smartphones and tablets have established themselves as central work tools in the public sector.

Requirements

Conventional device purchasing was no longer a solution for the rapidly changing requirements of the municipal administration. The city of Erkelenz therefore looked for an alternative and flexible solution for procuring mobile devices — and discovered Everphone.

Increased flexibility

Previously, the procurement of mobile devices was based on purchasing. However, this approach proved to be outdated in the course of digital transformation: purchasing devices was cost-intensive and inflexible. With the DaaS model from Everphone, the city of Erkelenz now procures mobile devices in a needs-based and flexible way.

Procurement of smartphones and tablets to order

The procurement of mobile devices by renting them means time savings and lower expenses. Other advantages include the flexibility of the rental model to meet demand and the mobile device management (MDM) provided by Everphone.

In addition to MDM, Everphone also offered the takeover of existing devices and the gradual modernization of the smartphone fleet. The key mechanism is a so-called buy and rent back (BARB) transfer.

Procurement of smartphones and tablets to order

Takeover of existing devices

Everphone has perfected buy and rent back (BARB) for mobile devices. Everphone first acquired the city's existing devices and then rented them back — equipped with a comprehensive service package. The devices remain with their users throughout the process and continue to be used without interruption.

Learn more about BARB

Fleet modernization with Google Pixel

IT can now progressively modernize devices and order newer models. Google Pixel smartphones are particularly popular at the Erkelenz municipal administration because they receive Android updates on day zero, do not compromise performance with bloatware, and offer impressive battery life. The municipal administration has decided to replace all Android devices in use with Google Pixel.

“Introducing devices from the Google Pixel series gave our Android fleet a noticeable modernization boost. On the one hand, productivity increased thanks to the high-performance and versatile Pixel models—on the other hand, the budget and planning security under Android was also a great advantage for us in IT.”