Ernst & Young LLP announced that Matt Miller, president of MobileDemand, a provider of rugged tablet PC systems for transportation, was honored as a finalist in the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year 2012 program in the Central Midwest region. The award recognizes entrepreneurs who demonstrate excellence and extraordinary success in such areas as innovation, financial performance and personal commitment to their businesses and communities.

Miller founded the company in 2003 when an opportunity presented itself with Anheuser-Busch. The company needed a way to deliver data to and from the field sales team at the point of transaction. Matt knew that the best way to deliver this data was to automate field sales with rugged tablet systems that would withstand the rigors of that environment. He left his then-current job to focus on developing a business based on this market opportunity.

After spending a year in his basement home office creating a business plan, engaging suppliers in Asia that manufactured rugged tablet PCs and going to industry trade shows, he successfully secured initial sales to three Iowa beer wholesalers. This gained the attention of Anheuser-Busch, and soon thereafter the xTablet officially was certified for sale to their network of more than 700 wholesalers.

Miller’s strategy was to focus on a succinct market niche in the early stages. Once the ground was laid in the beer market, he began to promote MobileDemand aggressively through Internet marketing to engage prospects in other markets; as a result, MobileDemand experienced rapid growth. Today, global companies in food and beverage distribution, manufacturing, retail, hospitality, field service, agriculture, utilities, military and public sector use MobileDemand xTablets.