idrive – Automotive Telematics Case Study

By 2035 it is estimated that there will be over 2 billion vehicles on the world’s roads, commercial vehicles making up a quarter of these drivers. Currently thousands of people are killed daily throughout the world by road accidents and many of these accidents involve some type of human error. Accidents can have detrimental effects on individuals, businesses, and our communities.

For companies that employ fleet drivers, there is a huge responsibility to ensure both the safety of their drivers and others on the road, as well as the reputation and safety of their business. In a time where businesses must strive to remain viable, unforeseen additional costs through damage, injury or harm to their business’ reputation are hard to bear.

To help alleviate some of this responsibility that transportation professionals have, idrive has developed an Artificially Intelligent (AI) dash camera system that reduces accidents by well over 50% and provides in-cab coaching to prevent accidents in real-time.

The idrive AI is a professional video event recorder that simultaneously captures two HD videos, one of the driver and one of the front of the vehicle, to give fleet managers a full picture of what is going on inside of a vehicle. The idrive AI is an intelligent camera system that features machine learning and driver recognition capabilities to capture detailed data for driver behavior coaching.

‘When a driver is being monitored they pay more attention to the rules of the road,’ says Sean O’Neil, CEO of idrive. ‘Our artificially intelligent system can also watch the driver for active distractions or drowsiness and alert them if those behaviors are detected. This is critical to preventing potential accidents from occurring.’

idrive uses advanced artificial intelligence to help in fleet monitoring. The idrive AI Cam helps companies identify and correct risky driving behavior. Machine vision can detect distracted driving, drowsy driving, safe following distance, and driver recognition (facial recognition).

Using AI and in-cab alerts combined with Pod Group’s telematics data transmission allows idrive fleets to reduce risky driving events by as much as 70%. Sensors incorporated in the device can detect different driving patterns such as hard braking and acceleration, aggressive driving, swerving, speeding, and open doors. Any of these ‘trigger events’ will cause the device to save the video recording immediately before and afterwards, providing a clear picture of the moments surrounding an incident.

When combined with the 3G/4G module, the video cameras provide real-time insights into the vehicle, so clients can monitor and observe their entire fleet securely from any desktop or mobile device immediately. All of the data collected is uploaded via Pod Group’s SIMs and is critical to generating driver reports that are used to coach drivers and get them back out on the road in a safer manner.

When devices are installed in busy, continually moving vehicles, it is essential that they can constantly transmit GPS and telematics data to HQ, and that changes can be made without having to interrupt the workflow of the fleet. Added to this, idrive devices need to be deployed anywhere in the world, without losing connection or having to manually access devices.

With idrive’s technology constantly improving, it is important to be able to push camera updates over cellular without disrupting the clients. Discovering Pod Group gave idrive the connectivity it needed to consolidate its service, make its devices more resilient against outages, and pass on the benefits to its customers.

idrive initially deployed Pod Group’s data SIM cards with a Multi-IMSI application, which can be configured remotely Over the Air (OTA), allowing the device to connect to a network on a completely different infrastructure in the event of issues on the core network. This increases the resilience of the application and ensures idrive’s devices always stay connected.

idrive subsequently deployed Pod Group’s eSIM solution to provide increased flexibility and future-proofing of the devices. The implementation of eSIM technology enables multiple network profiles to be added to the SIM and these profiles to be swapped and updated OTA when the devices are already in the field. This helps to optimize costs when rolling out global deployments, as devices can be shipped and then configured once they reach their destination.

It also protects against future rate changes on specific networks, as idrive can easily swap networks in and out as market conditions change. The combination of Pod’s Multi-IMSI applet on the eSIM bootstrap profile and multiple additional profiles on the SIM also adds resilience in the event of network issues on one of the profiles. In this instance, if the connection falls back to the bootstrap profile, the SIM can still switch between multiple core networks, ensuring maximum uptime of the connected device.

Facilitated by the unique connectivity solution and flat data rate provided by Pod Group, idrive is able to enhance its service and offer the reliable devices its customers required. ‘Working with Pod Group allows us to provide excellent global coverage for all of our fleet customers worldwide,’ explains Kelli Cosio of idrive Global. ‘We chose Pod Group as our provider because of the ease of use and competitive pricing.’

idrive’s hardware is perfectly complemented by Pod Group’s resilient eSIM technology, OTA provisioning and flat-rate roaming across borders. Together these technologies will grow and improve as the IoT expands.

As an additional service, idrive offers in-house data analysis for customers, relieving managers of the task and ensuring that their fleet data is being professionally monitored.  idrive, in turn, knows that it can rely on Pod Group for 24/7 expert technical support from a team with 20 years of first-hand experience in the IoT sector.

‘We have received excellent service and support,’ declares Kelli. ‘Thank you Pod Group!’ idrive’s association with Pod Group means that the company can confidently supply a sophisticated service integrated via reliable, intelligent and continuous connectivity, and future proof its devices however much the company’s business expands.