A Driver’s World And The Connected Truck

Imagine over 300 exhibitors showcasing the latest in heavy vehicles, technology engineering and innovation. Now imagine 40,000 plus attendees curious to learn what the future brings. This was the Brisbane Truck Show for 2017 and Teletrac Navman was front and centre.

Brisbane Truck Show

The Brisbane Truck Show, held this year 25-28 May, is organised by the Heavy Vehicle Industry Australia (HVIA) and has been running since 1968. The Show is recognised as the Australian transport industry’s premier event.

“It’s a huge event every year, and this one was probably the best one yet!” says Andrew Rossington, Vice President of Transtech a Division of Teletrac Navman.

“Who attends? Everyone! From managers and decision makers to drivers and their families, owners of truck companies and transport officials. They were all there.”

The way of the future

With technology advancing as quickly as it is, there was an array of topics around how this translates to the transport industry.

“Connected Trucks was the theme of the Teletrac Navman stand which served as an ice breaker and these conversations eventually led to discussions around fatigue management, which was a hot topic at the show. There was lots of interest in how Transtech, a division of Teletrac Navman, deals with fatigue, including Sentinel, our fatigue management product” says Andrew.

“Another hot topic was drivers and the chain of responsibility. We had a lot of conversations around the ‘Driver’s World’. This refers to a driver’s daily working life. The driver is front and centre in adhering to Chain of Responsibility legislation. So, the key is developing a practise of working with drivers to modify behaviour, rather than trying to impose change on them.”

According to Andrew, there was also plenty of discussion around the practicalities of adhering to the Chain of Responsibility, from speed management with GPS fleet tracking systems, to vehicle safety and vehicle check lists.

“During the show, we were also previewing our SmartNav product which will release in a couple of months. This product is all about route adherence. It uses jurisdictional information to provide turn by turn navigation to its drivers,” explains Andrew.

SmartNav is a product which allows companies to set permitted roads or route networks. This is particularly targeted to those who run dangerous goods (explosives, chemicals) and are only permitted to operate a specific route – they have no plan B route. It provides visibility back to the office to ensure that specific route is being taken, along with real-time alerts to both the driver and the back-office.

Another theme of the Brisbane Truck Show were business benefits of integrating GPS fleet tracking systems with other systems like freight management systems. A complete integration, or a ‘complete workflow’ as its sometimes known, means there is a continuous flow of information between systems which cover ordering, freight management, allocation and loading, and fleet management, creating a massively more efficient system by eliminating the need to manually enter information into the different systems.

It is clear technology is moving and moving fast, bringing with it promising changes to the transport industry. We’re excited to follow along and see how the connected truck further develops and reinforces the driver’s world.

Being compliant also means keeping your drivers safe, download our free Driver Safety eBook for more details.