Clear signals: Tech transforms fleet management

Software as a service, or SaaS, has been quietly revolutionising all sorts of businesses for a while now. Often referred to as on-demand software, SaaS has helped software companies move toward subscription-based models across a variety of industries, and fleet management is no exception.

Jim Atwell, Managing Partner of the emerging company practice at Deloitte & Touche, sees growth in fleet management solutions as part of that larger SaaS narrative.

“Through the efforts and utilisation of emerging technologies from these companies, we are witnessing greater business demands from across almost all industries,” he said in November. But there’s more than SaaS to this story, 

According to a 2015 report by market research firm Markets and Markets, the Fleet Management Market is expected to be worth $22.35 billion (Dh82 billion) by 2020, as the “integration of internet of things (IoT) technology with vehicles will increase the adoption of fleet management solutions”.

IoT, the networking of physical objects including TVs, white goods and vehicles, allows the sharing of data between physical objects and a central analytics hub. As IoT becomes more ubiquitous it will also help promote the adoption of fleet management solutions. The same report foresees slower adoption rates in some sectors as “cost sensitivity among small and medium fleet owners and government norms are expected to hinder the growth of fleet management”.

As the price of IoT entry lowers, that’s likely to change.

In simple terms, fleet management covers a company’s stable of vehicles from purchase to divestment. That includes everything from vehicle financing, tracking and maintenance to fuel management, vehicle and driver performance monitoring, and the eventual remarketing of assets. At the core of the discipline is a data-driven approach to the efficient management and administration of a fleet.

To achieve this goal, fleet management looks to minimise risk with up-to-the-minute data, keeping track of things such as operation management, asset management and driver management.

As organisations grow more complex in transport and logistics, they are intent on limiting both vehicle and driver downtime, which creates growing demand for software solutions to fleet management.

That demand is particularly evident in the growth of fleet management software provider Fleetmatics, which increased revenues by 151 per cent from 2011-2014.

“[Our] growth is based on our industry-leading mobile workforce platform and our unique data strategy,” said Jim Travers, Fleetmatics’ Chairman and CEO. “We remain laser-focused on transforming mobile workforce productivity with intuitive solutions that allow businesses to service customers more effectively.”

But before anyone could sell fleet management SaaS at all, Xerox had to invent an essential piece of technology, one so deeply embedded in computing that it’s almost easy to forget: the graphical user interface. Without it, there’d be no web browsers or cloud. So it’s no wonder that the forward-looking company is focused on the emerging intersection of data and transportation.

“Our focus is on providing services to cities and governments to help them work better, and fleet management is one of those services,” says Bill McKee from Xerox PR.

“Xerox provides a range of services to government agencies in the transportation field, including tolling, public transit and parking systems. We process more than $5 billion electronic tolls annually.” The company’s website states its product empowers managers to “take the pulse of their organisation at any given point in time”. The company says this fosters a transparency that improves resource and data management while also improving emergency response times.

And while Xerox is a big name with a fleet management product, Coca-Cola Bottling Consolidated (CCBCC), the largest independent Coca-Cola bottler in the US, has opted for a turnkey solution, using Spireon’s FleetLocate Platform.

“We chose FleetLocate because it was the only system we found that provided continuous real-time and accurate views of our entire fleet, which consists of over 800 trailers operating at hundreds of landmarks across the south-eastern US,” says David Hopkins, Senior Vice-President of CCBCC Operations on the company’s website.

“This unprecedented visibility into our fleet has allowed us to save significant costs, improve customer service and satisfaction, and make faster, more profitable business decisions.” 

FleetLocate Vice-President and General Manager Steve Blair said the match stems from FleetLocate’s configurability across a range of solutions: “FleetLocate offers continuous trailer monitoring with exception based reporting that turns information into business intelligence.

Working closely with CCBCC’s logistics team, we were able to quickly configure a solution that provided precisely the kind of information they needed to know about each trailer and its location.”

Another player, Melton Technologies, offers Horizon fleet management, a product that handles dispatch, billing and driver settlements, tax reporting, document imaging, and more. One interesting component at Melton is how it is using inbound marketing to recruit and retain drivers.

In a blog post, founder Chuck Melton said that social media could be the next sphere of fleet management, citing one client’s engagement with it as “a perfect example of the changing landscape for trucking companies — a highly energetic driver advocate who is using technology and social media to create a family atmosphere among 3,000 drivers.” 

So whether companies are tracking their driver’s movements in fleet vehicles, or watching over what they tweet from the road, the upshot is the industry has only just begun an interesting digital journey.

Fuel card and VHM integration and integration with multiple GPS solutions for automated odometer updates are offered, with DTC handling and fuel location exception reporting.

You get real time cloud-based GPS fleet-tracking software and hardware covering routing, work order management, maintenance scheduling, driver management and more. However, Fleetmatics lacks some of the features offered by competitors.

Spireon’s FleetLocate offers perhaps the most complete suite of GPS tracking products, which are powered by the company’s NSpire M2M intelligence platform.

The fleet and motor pool solutions by FleetCommander automate many facets of fleet management. While the product has a reputation for ease of use, it’s lack of routing capability makes it imperfect for some industries.

Horizon core trucking software covers dispatch, billing and driver settlements as well as tax reporting, document Imaging, EDI and mobile communications modules. The company has a reputation for excellent customer service.