In The Business Of Supporting Businesses TomTom Telematics' New WEBFLEET solution is designed to help businesses with fleets save on their bottom line, whether they're operating 400 trucks, or four vehicles.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
You're reading Entrepreneur South Africa, an international franchise of Entrepreneur Media.
Speak to a TomTom Telematics customer, and you'll soon realise that customer ROI is paramount. Neil Yates, founder of Binclean SA, says the company saw a 20% increase in production after installing WEBFLEET, as well as a reduction in its overtime bill and a 15% reduction in fuel spend.
For Christoph van Zyl, founder of Renavatio Vervoer, the on-the-ground impact of installing TomTom Telematics' system has been a game-changer. "The percentage of work done for money expenditure is not even relatable," he says. "The system works perfectly and has given us a return on investment of 8 000%. We save 2 000 litres of fuel per truck per month, simply because the system monitors driving style, idling time and a host of other data. Drivers can log in and check their performance on a scale of one to ten — and they're incentivised to do so. We pay monthly bonuses based on their personal scores out of ten."
VDM, a large transport business with over 160 trucks, uses TomTom Telematics to benchmark its fleet against predefined route surveys and, in so doing, enables massive savings in fuel and total turnaround time. "If you don't measure it, you can't know it," says VMD's CEO, Deon van der Merwe.
"Communicating via the WEBFLEET platform helps us to save time and creates a formal trail of correspondence with our drivers. I don't believe it's possible to successfully run a business like ours without a solution like this," he says.
Staying ahead of the game
"TomTom Telematics is in the business of helping businesses," says Justin Manson, National Sales Director, TomTom Telematics. "Our goal is to help our customers master their challenges. The right data at your fingertips will help you change the way you operate. How much cash is being left on the table in an organisation because of inefficiencies?
"A telematics system can radically improve productivity and workflow. Done correctly, a business can save up to 10% on its bottom line, and redeploy that cash into the company's growth, thanks to drivers reaching customers quicker and getting more done. The right data also increases productivity and ensures better turnaround times."
The system is also Open API, which means a business's various existing applications can communicate and interact with each other through WEBFLEET. "From a productivity perspective, we no longer need to manually capture any trip information," says Deon. "In addition, we have every conceivable piece of data available that will assist us to run a leaner, more cost-effective fleet, ensuring we deliver on all our KPIs — particularly when meeting our customers' needs."
Deon believes the benefits for SMEs are as great, if not more so. "Many SMEs don't have the back-office support that we do. The ability to capture and use this information without a team of admin specialists at your disposal is a huge competitive advantage for smaller businesses," he says.
The TomTom Telematics difference
Renavatio Vervoer's Christoph van Zyl agrees. "Rising fuel costs, inefficiencies and the challenges of locating our customers were putting a huge strain on our business," he says. "I had a friend who worked for TomTom Telematics and he had told me about their solutions. Cash flow in this business is tight, and I hadn't entertained the idea of investing in additional hardware or software, but I was getting desperate. I called him and asked him to walk me through the solution. Within half an hour I was sold."
Like many transport operators in South Africa, Christoph believed the capital expenditure to set up a telematics system across his fleet would have put too much strain on his cash flow. However, because the TomTom Telematics team has worked so closely with local operators and understands their needs and challenges, a subscription model has been developed whereby customers don't need to invest a large capital outlay into TomTom Telematics' technology, but receive the tech and software, including installation, at no extra cost, in exchange for a monthly subscription fee.
This fact was a gamechanger for Christoph and many business owners like him — he could instal ground-breaking technology into his fleet without a capital outlay. "It was this model that made the solution possible for us, and the impact on our business was immediate."
About TomTom Telematics
TomTom Telematics is a business unit of TomTom dedicated to fleet management, vehicle telematics and connected car services. WEBFLEET is a Software-as-a-Service solution, used by small to large businesses to improve vehicle performance, save fuel, support drivers and increase overall fleet efficiency. TomTom Telematics is one of the world's leading telematics solution providers with more than 785 000 subscriptions worldwide, servicing drivers in more than 60 countries.
Visit telematics.tomtom.com/tellmemore and follow us on Twitter @TomTomWEBFLEET
