Telematics
Telematics is the convergence of wireless communications, vehicle monitoring systems, and location devices. Among the many users of telematics are public utility and service fleets such as Sears, UPS and Wal-Mart in the USA and Gaz Metro and Bell in Canada.
Recently as the technology’s cost have come down making the ROI even more compelling, Institutions and Corporations in other market segments such as school buses, snow removal vehicles and landscaping are increasingly using the service to manage their fleets. These fleets use telematics for dispatching, monitoring route adherence, geo-fencing and to measure idling, fuel consumption, fleet utilization, start & stop, excessive speeding, after-hours usage, and PTO operation. Sometimes the mere fact of having the capability acts as deterrence to wasteful or misuse behaviour.
AWI provides complete turn-key solutions for telematics. From doing a needs assessment and installing vehicle equipment to providing backend training and easy to use real-time, interactive graphical reports for management use. We have installed and operate many thousands of telematic devices.
The components of telematics are an in-vehicle device, wireless cellular network, and a web based host running fleet applications such as dispatch, geo-fence, alerts for out-of-tolerance parameters and real time reports.
AutoVision® Wireless Inc. has developed several in-vehicle telematic devices such as the TelePod, AV2000 and the AV3000NX. In addition AWI has integrated several 3rd party telematic devices such as Trimble’s TrimTrac and Skywave’s MT3550 and dual mode satellite/cellular device, Surelinx 8100. If a customer has legacy devices or wants to use a specific device not on our list then we will integrate the new devices into AutoVision®. This normally takes a about 4 weeks.
AWI bundles Bell Mobility’s cellular CDMA-1x airtime for its services in Canada and KORE’s GSM-GPRS airtime for services in Canada and the USA. We have chosen a modem that is easily replaceable with a HSPA modem. This protects your investment when cellular networks start converting to HSPA. For satellite coverage in North America, AWI uses Inmarsat’s L-Band network. For dual mode applications, AWI employs a least-cost algorithm to minimize airtime costs in toggling between satellite and cellular networks.
The data from the vehicle feeds into AutoVision® that is resident at our Tier 4 data center. For added security, AWI has a redundant data center at another location. Access to AutoVision® is through any web based browser.
Simple in its operation yet sophisticated enough to adapt to customer requirements like allowing the vehicle to idle if its in drive mode.