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All right. Well, I'm happy to be here with David Glinds, director of product management
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on the technology product space for wheels. Thanks for being here, David.
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Thank you for having me. Yeah, absolutely. Love talking technology, love talking safety,
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love talking driver interaction with new products as it relates to fleets.
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So let's get in to some, what are some next-gen things that you're seeing out in the marketplace
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in terms of technology that fleets are really going to start to have to pay attention to?
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Yeah, I think the connected data obviously is at the forefront of everyone's mind, especially
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OEM connected data, how quickly can we get that data into the wheels systems and not
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just get the data in, but how quickly can you make it actionable and valuable to both
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the drivers and the fleets? Yeah, for sure. I mean, we've had that issue for years with
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the data overload as a phrase that we've been having for 15 years. How are we doing that
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in ways that are a little bit more effective than it was, say, six, seven years ago?
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Yeah, I think obviously AI is the big game changer in the last few years. No surprises
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there. I think the connected data and how you can take those events and curate a unique
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experience for the drivers in the moment is the groundbreaking new technology that we're
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seeing out there. So imagine someone is a driver, a fleet driver, and they have a number
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of speeding events, seatbelt events, crash, God forbid, and all of a sudden the technology
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itself can create and curate a custom lesson for them saying, hey, Chris, I noticed over
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the last few days, few weeks, your driving behavior has been erratic on this day you did
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this, on this day you did that. And it's an actual avatar training that person on their
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driving behavior. So instead of the standardized 20 courses that a lot of fleets are using
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and assigned to the drivers, some of the emerging technologies out there are creating on the
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fly training specifically for drivers. It's sophisticated, very cool stuff. Yeah, really.
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And so a fleet manager doesn't have to get so specific with that. I mean, the AI or
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the program is going to say, okay, these are your drivers, these are your risks. These
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are training that I can assign to these drivers. And the fleet manager can basically say,
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go for it. And then it gets pushed out. Exactly. The fleet manager creates the parameters,
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what are the specific behaviors, the specific events that they want to focus on and all of
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a sudden the training behind the scenes can be curated for that specific driver. Wow,
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very cool. Where are we at with safety sort of in cab coaching? I mean, that's been around
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for a while. Where do you see that going? So I think the number of inquiries that we
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received in the last year for cameras and in cab coaching has dwarfed any other year.
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So it's only no kidding increasing. Yeah, it's okay. A number of inquiries per week. It's
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exciting to see the technology take hold and people really interested in it. I think the
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cost has been a barrier a little bit. Those costs are coming down. Technology evolves,
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which is great. I think the in cab coaching can be effective. We've seen it be effective
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initially where a driver immediately will change the behavior based upon the beeping or if there's
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a voice in the in cab experience, if there's no coaching going along with that from a person,
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a manager or a safety manager, or again, in the future, one of these customizable,
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configurable on the fly training sessions, then the behavior will just start to go back into
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that habits. Right. So it's not just the alerts in the cab by itself really won't work. It has to
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be the alerts coupled with coaching from a safety manager or a line manager. Sure. Okay.
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Now let's talk about driver communication in general. I mean, we have sort of this
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divider evolution with younger drivers in how they interact with social media. I mean,
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the old method of text messages and emails may be, I don't know, evolving into something else.
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Where do you see that going? I think that the attention span of and even not just the younger
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generations of all of us is becoming shorter. So I think that the communication needs to be succinct,
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can't hit people over the heads with too much text. That's not groundbreaking information,
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I guess, but I think that's what we are seeing in the safety spaces is following those trends as well.
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So how do we effectively reach the driver in the moment, too? So it's the reaction that you're
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seeing from the driver based upon that specific behavior. If it's too far off in the future,
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from whenever they the event occurred, then it will be a meaningless instruction to the driver.
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So short succinct to the point and again, coupled with the coaching can be more effective.
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Yeah. And that's really cool. I mean, really what I'm getting from you is that we are really being
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able to fine tune reactions to behaviors and specific coaching and communicating and coaching,
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essentially. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that the the fleets that care a lot about safety and
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the fleets that care and have the budget for safety, they'll realize that the camera investments
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make sense, right? So you have one fatal accident, one very bad accident, the costs are
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can be astronomical and you're kicking yourself or not having the technology in place earlier. So
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I think the smart fleets are getting ahead of it. They're the risk department,
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safety department are putting these in place and realizing that allocating the budget to it
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makes sense. Well, and I was going to follow up on that in terms of where technology budget is
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better placed. I mean, there's a lot of technology out there and it's kind of expensive on the
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face of it, right? Do you see any areas where the ROI seems to be better? I think that the camera
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ROI is strong. I think it also kind of depends on the type of fleet that it is,
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shared service vehicles, for example, versus an assigned vehicle. You're going to get a lot more
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sales drivers that are reluctant to install this type of in-cab technology. Sure. When you start
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positioning the technology as this is going to save you and prevent you from being held responsible,
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all of a sudden the conversation changes with our clients. That's one of the benefit that we've
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had in shifting the conversation about why, you know, instead of being brother, it seems to be
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more of a dated conversation with the clients compared to where it is now. Now it's about how is
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this technology going to help you? For shared fleets that use our checkout solution, for example,
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or shared vehicle managing who is in what vehicle, what time. It's easier to sell a technology
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solution like cameras because they know that it's also going to protect them on the job. They're
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driving for their job specifically. They want that actual protection. Okay. And have you seen
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on the corporate fleet space because we're talking about salespeople that are making a lot of
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money for the company, where they might be a little bit more receptive now to cameras because
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of the safety aspect. I think a little bit. I think there's still more resistance than you'll see
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on the service side, but it's different than it was five years ago. People are, I mean, again,
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some companies are saying that you're not going to be hired unless you have this, right? So those
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types of companies are real. They must have had something in the past that made them sure.
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Create that policy. And I think they were seeing a little bit of resistance, but not as much
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as we used to. Okay. Hey, last question. Let me ask you sort of big picture. What's on the horizon
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that fleets may be not paying too much attention to, but they need to start. We're talking about
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2026 and beyond. What's evolving that's on your radar that you want to tell our fleet audience?
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I think that the connected data inside the driver's hand and making it actionable is the number one
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thing that we'll see this year, right? So how do you get ahead of maintenance because of the
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company you're receiving, right? Again, this is not the, you know, diagnostic trouble goes have been
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around for a long time. How, you know, you see a check engine light on your dash. Do you necessarily
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know what the meaning of that is? No. But if you have the technology to interpret that code for you
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and you can see in your mobile app or on desktop portal, the explanation of what that area is,
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and then all of a sudden you schedule an appointment. Yep. And now those codes are going over to the shop
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before you even get to the shop. Yep. That's where we see the our technology going and where we see
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the industry going. Sure. Excellent. Well, David, thank you for taking the time today. I really
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appreciate it. You're welcome. Yeah. Thanks. All right.