Roadmap - Vehicle tracking and fleet intelligence news - February 2014

Roadmap monthly newsletter
Vehicle Tracking and Fleet Intelligence News

February 2014

In this issue

Editorial

H

News and Events

ave you heard of V2V?

If you haven’t yet, I am sure that in the next few years it will become as
common as today it is to listen to other acronyms such as GPS, PDF or HTTP.

Road safety in the safe hands of
Frotcom East Africa

V2V means Vehicle to Vehicle communication and refers to data communication
between two nearby vehicles. There are many possible reasons why it is interesting
to have vehicles communicating between them, but one of the most compelling
reasons regards safety.

Frotcom International invests in
brand new data centre to maximize
service level and performance

By exchanging anonymous, vehicle-based data
regarding position and speed, V2V
communications enable a vehicle to
antecipate threats through awareness of the
position and movement of other vehicles in
the vicinity. It is possible to calculate the risk,
issue driver warnings or recommendations; or
in some cases even to take control of the
vehicle to avoid accidents.
The news is that in the US, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
(NTHSA) announced on February 3rd that its “two-year pilot of V2V technology
proved that the transmission of basic safety data between cars, such as speed and
position, improves the safety of all vehicles on the road”. Therefore, the NHTSA “will
begin taking steps to enable vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication technology for
light vehicles.”
You can see an interesting
http://youtu.be/PF1a-g9suR8.

collision

avoidance

video

with

V2V

in

On a personal note, I wonder how or whether Europe will react to this
announcement when eCall is still a little too embarrassing to serve as a model for
cooperation between the EC and car manufacturers.
PS – Frotcom International closed 2013 with excellent results once again and a
turnover growth YoY of around 17%. Very inspiring, in a time when so many
countries and companies went through such an economic and financial turmoil.
Valério Marques, CEO - Frotcom International
A note from the editor – If you would like to have your own say in the next edition of this newsletter, please
do not hesitate to get in touch at roadmap@frotcom.com.
Frotcom - Vehicle Tracking . Fleet Intelligence | Tel + 351 214 135 670 | www.frotcom.com
Angola |Belgium |Brazil |Bulgaria |Cameroon |Cape Verde |Colombia |Cyprus |Croatia |Egypt |Georgia |Greece |Italy |Kenya |Kosova |Luxembourg |
Macedonia |Madagascar |Mauritius |Morocco |Namibia |Portugal |Reunion Islands |Romania |Rwanda |Seychelles |Sierra Leone |Slovenia |
South Africa |Spain | Tanzania |Uganda |UK |

1

“Dar a Volta” team’s adventure
through South America is about to
end

Case Study
EMŠA Šped reduced fuel costs by
10% using Frotcom

This and much more…

Did you know?

News and Events
Road safety in the safe hands of Frotcom East Africa

Online library of road safety
mass media campaigns

You probably remember last year’s road
safety initiative promoted by Frotcom
East Africa, Airtel Kenya and 2NK SACCO,
to encourage safe driving of public
service vehicles and to reduce accidents
on Kenyan roads.
To continue to raise awareness of road
safety and change driving attitudes and
behaviour in Kenya, Frotcom East Africa
recently launched a billboard campaign
to let businesses know that they can
count on Frotcom East Africa as a
partner for road safety and fleet
profitability.
Currently located in 3 strategic locations that capture over 75% of the traffic
entering Nairobi, these billboard ads are really grabbing the attention of Kenian fleet
owners and managers.

The World Health Organization (WHO)
has launched a new tool to support
development of strong road safety
mass media campaigns around the
world.
The “Online library of road safety mass
media campaigns” is a new resource
made available to governments and
civil society organizations.

Roadmap congratulates Frotcom East Africa for this successful project!
Background

Frotcom International invests in brand new data centre
to maximize service level and performance
Frotcom’s Database was recently migrated to a new
server hardware which dramatically increases processing
power, memory and storage.
Based on Dell PowerEdgeTM chassis, and featuring the
latest Intel CPU technology, the new infrastructure
provides maximum performance, efficiency and stability.
The server’s hardware comes with 2 CPU Intel Xeon E5
10-Core 3.0GHz each (total of 20 cores), 256GB RAM and
around 5TB of storage, composed of:
-

Ultrafast enterprise grade Solid State Disks for live data
SAS 15K RPM disks for older data
SAS 10K RPM for backups

At the same time, Frotcom migrated to SQL Server 2012 Enterprise edition. In total,
the new infrastructure represents a phased investment of over 180K€ in hardware
and software licenses.
With this investment, Frotcom International aims at ensuring a maximum
performance and stability of operations to scale up with the current growth in the
number of clients and vehicles tracked.

2

Worldwide more than 1.2 million
people die as a result of a road traffic
crash each year, and as many as 50
million are injured. Most of these
tragedies can be prevented. Avoiding
speeding, drinking and driving and
distracted
driving,
and
using
motorcycle helmets, seat-belts, and
child restraints are key to saving lives.
Such actions can be promoted through
the development of comprehensive
road safety legislation and rigorous
enforcement.
To increase public awareness of road
safety laws and persuade the public to
abide
by
them,
governments
complement
legislation
and
enforcement with the broadcasting of
mass media campaigns. This library
offers a selection of road safety mass
media campaigns to encourage and
inspire those developing such
campaigns.

Source: World Health Organization

Tip of the month!

News and Events
“Dar a Volta” team’s adventure
through South America is about
to end
It’s been almost a year since Roadmap
reported the new adventure of the “Dar a
Volta” team, this time in South America.
On March 2013, Inácio and Leninha hit the
road in a Volkswagen Camper (baptized
“Walentina”) with the intention of visiting 14
countries, travelling more than 40.000 kms, in
13 months.
The adventure began in Sao Paulo (Brazil)
where the couple bought Walentina and
where a Frotcom tracking device was
installed, allowing fans to follow their journey.
During this exciting adventure, Inácio and Leninha had the chance to meet and
experience many different cultures in South America – Brazil, Uruguay,
Paraguay, Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador and Colombia, where they
visited Lina Bernal, Director at Frotcom Colombia.

Choose alternative units for
mileage, speed and fuel
consumption
Different countries use different units
to measure mileage, speed and fuel
consumption.
Frotcom allows you to select which set
of units to use in your account.
Options available are:
Mileage - km (kilometres); mi (miles)
Speed - km/h (kilometres per hour);
mph (miles per hour)
Fuel consumption - L/100km (litres per
100km); mpg (miles per gallon); km/L
(kilometres per litre)
By default, the accounts should already
have the most adequate units for its
country. However, if you want to
change the units, do as follows.
Go to Administration > Company
profile > General. Edit it and choose
your preferred units.
Mileage and speed units are coupled. If
you choose km for mileage you will
have km/h for speed. If you choose mi
for mileage you will have mph for
speed.

Inácio, Leninha (Dar a Volta team) and Lina (Frotcom Colombia).

As these words are being written, they are leaving Manaus (Brazil) and in April
the adventure will end where it began – in Sao Paulo (Brazil).
For further information, pictures and videos of the trip, visit their blog or
Facebook page (both in Portuguese).
Roadmap congratulates the Dar a Volta team for this successful adventure!

3

You can choose the fuel consumption
units independently, although the
normal choice when you have km for
mileage is to have L/100km for fuel
consumption; and the normal choice
when you have mi for mileage is to
have mpg for fuel consumption.
After making the changes, remember
to Save the new definitions.
Note: when you change the units, you
will be logged out after a warning
window. Login again to see the effect
of the changes you made.

Next, on
Roadmap

Case Study
EMŠA Šped reduced fuel costs by 10% using Frotcom
EMŠA Šped, one of the Top 200 Macedonian companies, streamlined its
processes and managed to reduce fuel costs using Frotcom Vehicle Tracking and
Fleet Management system.
EMŠA Šped is a Macedonian transportation company working all around Europe,
since 1999. They have an annual turnover of 15.5M€, own more than 120 trucks and
manage their business partners’ fleets in Macedonia and in other European
countries.

News and events, more
new Frotcom features and
tips will be presented.

This and more, so don’t
miss the next issue of
Roadmap.

In order to improve delivery, planning and the allocation of resources, EMŠA Šped
knew that a fleet tracking and fleet management system would be the solution to
guarantee a sustainable, well-timed and accountable transport service to its
customers.
After reviewing the available telematics systems in the market, the company chose
Frotcom because it completely covers their tracking needs. Furthermore, they can
use this solution not only in Macedonia, but also throughout all Europe without any
extra costs.
Mr. Emshov Marjan, owner of EMŠA Šped said, “I rely on Frotcom because it’s
userfriendly and has complete functionalities. Different clients have different needs
and Frotcom has the right solution for each situation. Before implementing
Frotcom, with so many activities to keep an eye on, it was easy to lose track of
things. We surely benefit from Frotcom to increase productivity – more deliveries in
less time. Moreover, Frotcom’s CANBus and Fuel Management modules also
enabled us to decrease fuel costs by 10%”.
EMŠA Šped has been using Frotcom for almost two years and nowadays they have
the system installed on all their vehicles.
Roadmap congratulates Frotcom Macedonia for this successful project!

4

Roadmap - Vehicle tracking and fleet intelligence news - February 2014

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Roadmap - Vehicle tracking and fleet intelligence news - February 2014