Canada – Moving into the AI, digitalisation and software-as-a-service space, Canadian tech firm Geotab Inc of Oakville, Ontario, just outside Toronto, a specialist in transportation telematics systems, finally held the launch of its long-awaited generative AI-powered fleet management software (Geotab Ace) at Geotab Connect in Las Vegas in February 2024. T&BB has been tracking this story for what feels like a millennium and having emerged out of the beta version of Project G, Geotab Ace is gaining a quiet reputation in the industry as a value-added necessity for fleet managers. We interviewed David Savage, Geotab’s Vice President for the UK and Ireland to get a better sense of the planned rollout of this new and exciting product.

The Company – Products & Services

Geotab is the global leader in fleet telematics operating for over two decades, across 130 different countries with over 50,000 end customers, amounting to over 4 million subscriptions (connected vehicles). Founded in 2000 by CEO Neil Cawse, the company employs more than 2,000 people in multiple offices around the world including Madrid, Rome, Paris, London, and Oakville, to name a few. Interestingly, Cawse never took the company public and so Geotab remains a privately owned family-run entity. This, according to Savage, has allowed the business to execute against a long-term vision without the need to appease external investors.

David Savage, Geotab’s Vice President for the UK and Ireland

There are four key areas of the business: The Geotab “GO9 device”, connects directly to the vehicle, capturing and transmitting vehicle data including location, engine diagnostics and driver behaviour. This feeds into the software component, “MyGeotab,” which, to quote Savage, is the “engine room of the company”. This is a web-based platform that uses and analyses all of the data points (75 billion data points collected a day) driving analytical insights that contribute toward fleet efficiency for the operators. This data, according to Savage, is used to de-risk decision-making by removing the element of doubt, helping mitigate potential hazards. Of course, the bigger the fleet, the more data, the better the decision-making process.

The third element is Geotab Drive, a cloud-based storage service provided by Google that allows users to save files online and access them from any smartphone, tablet, or computer. Using Google Drive, users can create and store documents, spreadsheets, presentations, photos, and a wide range of other file types. This service is currently only available in certain parts of the world.

Finally, the Geotab Marketplace is the ecosystem – think the app store for Apple users. This is supported by Order Now, allowing Geotab customers to manage ordering, delivery and after-sales support online. With Order Now, users may be able to access a streamlined ordering process directly through their Geotab account dashboard or through a dedicated portal, where they can select the items they need, manage their order details, track shipment status, and quickly complete transactions without having to navigate away from the Geotab platform.

Recently Geotab added Lytx cameras, which are now available on the Marketplace platform. Geotab plans to continue adding more products from several other third- party manufacturers onto this platform in the future to help fleet managers further increase productivity, improve sustainability, enhance the transition to electric vehicles (EV), decrease fuel costs, and optimise driver safety through a fully integrated ecosystem on one platform. Speaking about the Geotab Marketplace, Savage said: “By streamlining the online purchasing process Geotab is providing customers with the power of choice. The Geotab Marketplace ecosystem enables users to have the flexibility to buy exactly what they want, with their orders fulfilled by Geotab partners on Order Now. With a single point of billing and 24/7 support provided by Geotab, it is the latest tool in our armoury to make buying and selling on the Geotab Marketplace as easy and simple as possible, expanding the range of products and options we provide from participating partners.”

New software services are constantly being rolled out as the company courts new partners including dispatching software, maintenance management tools and asset tracking.

Geotab Ace

Originally the company foresaw the rise of electrification (BEVs) back in 2008. Cawse knew that AI would play a pivotal role as a significant value add in fleet management. Early on the philosophy was that companies who don’t harness AI will fall behind in terms of productivity.

Project G was the beta version of what has now become Geotab Ace. This was trialled in the real world with several partners for anywhere between 6 to 12 months with the primary stress tests taking place in Canada, the UK, France and the USA. The R&D was primarily done in the head office in Oakville, Canada, however, Savage confirmed that a lot more of that development work is now taking place in the facility in Madrid, Spain.

Unveiled at the 2024 Geotab Connect event in Las Vegas, select customers were granted early access to the product, with a phased roll-out in different territories over the next few years. Geotab Ace will be accessible on the My Geotab platform, based on a subscription-as-a-service (monthly fee) business model. The focus currently, is on the private sector, building up a customer base and building up trust with the general public in AI. Savage said that the company has to actively combat the negative narratives surrounding AI, namely that it will kill jobs. Another short-term goal is “working” the AI, by constantly feeding it more reliable data sets, to help it learn. Functionality can be tweaked relatively easily, according to Savage. 

Geotab Ace

The Software

Built on the Microsoft Azure OpenAI Service, the software (Geotab Ace), available on the “My Geotab” platform, uses a chatbot assistant that enables customers to ask questions through a chat interface about their vehicle fleet in areas including vehicle performance, vehicle usage, fuel economy, cost savings and more. The data collected and transmitted through the GO9 device includes safety analytics, trip data, zone activity, electric vehicle statistics, exception events, GPS tracking, and more. This allows Geotab Ace to provide nuanced answers to a broader range of complex questions while remembering past interactions to improve future responses. Therefore, the customer receives immediate, data-driven answers to help improve efficiency and reduce vehicle downtime. Geotab believes this is the future of connected transportation analytics.

The core differentiators, according to Savage, lie in the open nature of Geotab’s platform, resulting in easy integration with third-party solutions. The customisation aspect is paramount, with each fleet possessing its requirements with the open platform and customisation allowing the end fleet managers to address their fleet needs. For example, the last mile segment can look at idling rates, harsh braking/acceleration and dwell times. Essentially all of the insights and prompts that come through will be focused on improving those specific operational needs, improving efficiency and the safety of that given fleet. Savage touched on scalability; they can tailor their solutions to fleets with a couple of vehicles all the way up to operators with hundreds of thousands of vehicles. As aforementioned, improving the analytical insights will inevitably come from better and more reliable data which is why Geotab employs hundreds of data analysts around the world.

Founder & CEO of Geotab, Neil Cawse

Data Protection

Another point of differentiation that Savage was keen to highlight, is the level of government organisations that Geotab works with, including in North America. The same goes for some of the large-scale end customers they work with, which require specific certifications. Data privacy has become business-critical for the company. This is why they employ over 200 data scientists, with a specific privacy team covering every element.

In terms of managing government legislation in different markets, the UK still uses Europe’s new data privacy and security law, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which remains the guiding principle. Savage pointed out that Geotab is in line with the North American accreditations, the “gold standard in privacy legislation”.

Geotab Safety Suite

Geotab has also used the Connect event to highlight its safety tools. Another feature recently added is the Geotab Safety Centre, accessible on the MyGeotab platform. The same principle as Geotab Ace, an AI-driven software provides safety tools offering enhanced visibility into fleet risk. Key data includes safety scorecards, video telematics, asset tracking and performance risk analysers which all increase the operational safety and reputability of fleets. Plenty of R&D has gone into the implementation of an enhanced Collision Detection feature as part of its 2024 safety tools. This will enhance how fleets can detect minor as well as major collisions, through a tool that is precise and accurate.

Sabina Martin, Vice President of product management at Geotab, said:

We understand the gravity of safety concerns in the transportation industry and are proactively taking steps ahead utilising the power of quality data and AI. With Geotab Safety Centre, we're not just providing visibility into risks, we're helping companies to predict and prevent them. Our enhanced and predictive collision insights put data-driven decisions at our customers' fingertips, helping to transform the way they approach safety, and ultimately fostering safer roads for everyone. In a data-driven world, immediacy and precision of insights are paramount.

Sabina Martin, Vice President of product management at Geotab

Future plans

Savage confirmed that the company has doubled in terms of connected vehicles in the last four years. This exponential growth has taken nearly two decades to achieve. Savage says that the company aims to grow in a sustainable and non-reckless way with the ambition to retain the mantle of being the number one fleet telematics provider in the world.

Working with third parties to get more applications on the platform is the immediate goal along with slowly rolling out Geotab Ace to ever more customers. The medium-term vision is to transform the connected transition vehicle segment through trusted transportation data-driven insight.  Data privacy and security is at the forefront of this. The company continues to invest in product development, becoming subject matter experts within fleet telematics segments. All in all, Savage confirmed that the decision to use an “open platform” is paying dividends now, with  hundreds of  partners in the ecosystem.

In the long term, building up relationships with OEMs to be able to ingest their data will keep them competitive. As the market changes, Savage envisages fleet management moving from the domain of the aftermarket, to becoming an OEM partner. This is because fleet telematics has become a pivotal part of the vehicle from its inception, in part driven by changing legislation such as the Direct Vision Standard in London. OEMs of course pull in their own data points but those will vary, where a fleet manager wants a uniform set of data points at a granular level, which Geotab provides.

Geotab stand at the 2023 RTX Expo

Investments

The company is continually expanding with plans to open another office in Australia. Savage said they were keen to take advantage of growth in multiple parts of the United Kingdom. Savage confirmed that to achieve this, Geotab UK is making a concerted effort to increase its presence across the UK by deploying more sales teams into different regions and market segments to speak with potential customers and operators. Geotab’s Partner Day takes place at this year’s Commercial Vehicle Show (2024), from 23 – 25 April at the NEC in Birmingham, UK.

A map of the various Geotab offices around the world