I’ve got my poser phone, I’ve got my laptop, I’ve got my portable modem, I might as well go home – this is the kind of mobile worker that the managing director of Andest Communications Ltd is trying to appeal to, with the launch of the company’s latest portable product, a V.32 bis modem. Managing director Tony Sellars believes that mobile workers will become an increasingly important part of the workforce. The skill shortage, he says, means that those with the skills will be able to demand to work wherever they want to, and that this is more likely to be at home than in the office. Cellular phones are beginning to feel pinch as the once essential Yuppie item is deemed an expensive, expendable luxury in harder times. But Sellars says even the recession can be beneficial to the UK launch of the modem, because recessions spawn redundant employees -turned -freelancers and he hopes to draw these into the portable modem market too. Milton Keynes-based Andest is distributing the product for manefacturers Touchbase Systems Inc, headquartered in New York. Sellars claims that the modem, dubbed WorldPort 9600, is the first portable battery powered V.32 modem. It is pocket-sized, 4.8 by 2.7 by 1, has full duplex data transmission at 9600 bits per second and includes MNP class 4 error correction. WorldPort also includes an interface for an acoustic coupler so that it can be used where direct connection to a phone line is not possible – in a phone box and in hotel rooms where the phone is hard wired. Sellars says that the modem can be used anywhere in the world that has a standard telephone system, but that in some countries it’s advisable to send data at a slower rate.
