Special technology report TRANSPORT MANAGEMENT
Frank Felten, vice president product
management & marketing, PTV.
of performance. However he adds that it is not yet fully ready, due to
its diversity, for the implementation of a telematics standard in business data and KPIs. And as the industry matures in IT terms, Hannah believes that a better under - standing of the amount of time required to integrate a successful IT solution could be achieved, as well as an increase in pragmatism about how business processes need to change to get the most out of a solution.
Irvin Gray, marketing manager UK & Ireland, TomTom Business Solutions, comments that with a state-of-the-art telematics system, the fleet manager benefits from better visibility and management of the fleet helping to meet his objectives from saving costs to reducing carbon footprint. He adds that the driver benefits from mapping and routing as well as live HD traffic to keep them moving, increase productivity and ease stress. In the case of TomTom’s offerings, this is complemented by a job dispatch facility that allows jobs to be sent through complete with address of the destination, so the driver can navigate there by simply tapping the screen. Because of
this, Gray points out that the need for calling round on the mobile is greatly diminished. Charlie Pesti, UK key account manager at Transporeon, observes that environmental issues are a key talking point for both governments and logistics professionals alike. However, he believes that to be attractive to commercial organisations a system must also deliver significant benefits in cost cutting and efficiency, as well as clearly monitor environmental costs and impact. “Never has this been more important than in the present economic climate,” said Pesti. He also points out that there is a lot of talk about possible collaborations within the transport industry.
From the perspective of Frank Felten, vice president product management & marketing, PTV, process and business efficiency have always played an important role in transport management and are still key user require - ments. “Any product or solution that supports optimised transport operations is high on the list,” he said. Nathan Pieri, SVP marketing & product management at Management Dynamics, comments that
Charlie Pesti, UK key account manager, Transporeon.
international transportation management solutions today help companies manage seafreight and airfreight costs and automate the process of quoting and preparing proposals. But most importantly, he stresses that the solutions must be able to handle the new complexities of the recent deregulation of ocean shipping. “Therefore, even in these tough times, these transportation manage ment solutions can help companies optimise costs and allow logistics providers to better differentiate their service while improving sales effective - ness,” he said.
Jon Hannah, product manager, Isotrak.
The functionality debate
In terms of the systems currently available, what are some of the main functionality differentiators and other attributes that users should be aware of? Hannah cites real-time planning and execution visibility. “As integration between systems continues, the ability for plan commitments to be changed throughout the day based on real-time events (traffic, delivery issues) by using live tracking data has provided a new wave of KPI savings for customers with mature telematics systems,” he said. Hannah also points to telemetry information. “As CO2 and fuel saving are driving so many projects within the industry, a need to prove savings in these areas, both from a real saving and public point of view, has led more and more customers to introduce telemetry systems in-vehicle, which accurately measure not only the use of fuel (and therefore its carbon footprint) but also provide information on how drivers are performing,” he explained.
Harbey believes that as the use of telematics becomes more widespread and is accepted as a ‘must have’ for transport operations, the focus will be on maximising the return from the investment in the technology. One area that is not being exploited, in Harbey’s view, is the use of the telematics data to deliver prognostics. “Prognostics will help improve vehicle availability as it will provide the >>
www.logisticsit.com December 2010
MANUFACTURING &LOGISTICS
IT 43
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