The Power of Big Data

In a world that is predominantly built around DATA, Geotab has seen the power and impact that it has in the Fleet Management space.
“BIG DATA” is the key pillar on which any business could make themselves successful, in a short period of time.
Fleet managers are bombarded by streams and streams of data. 90% of the time no decisions are made based on the data due to its size and complexity. At Geotab we analyse and present this data to customers in a way that is simple and manageable.
Decisions are made on information, not the data alone. By first identifying what data is available and can be combined, informed decisions can then be made about improving operations, in turn enabling services to be more efficient and harnessing the power of data, information and insight to design and deliver services in new ways.
“Big data” is a term used to represent large, complex sets of data. This data is vast because in today’s world, data is generated in real time by many sources, including people, vehicles, and devices at all points on the supply and demand chain. The list of data points and sources is ever-growing and can include hundreds, if not thousands of sources.
Fleet managers receive data constantly from these and other sources. The data is highly diverse in character, including different generation intervals, unique identifiers and code values specific to the device or application, plus many different data formats. Because the data is so varied, the challenge lies in aggregating and simplifying it to produce meaningful analyses.
Big data is essential in gaining insight into business activities. These insights are important because they will ultimately lead to informed, data-driven decisions. Fleet professionals need quick access to accurate, reliable, secure, real-time information. They must be able to obtain it anywhere, anytime in order to make informed, time-sensitive decisions. In short, they need a way to harness big data and Geotab provides the platform through our advanced SDK (Software Development Kit) and open API (Application Programming Interface) do achieve this.
Big data does not replace human judgment. Analytics-driven technology combined with personalized fleet management expertise leads to success in translating big data into actionable steps. These steps allow an organization to optimize fleet performance and meet organizational goals. Even highly experienced fleet managers can benefit from working with analysts from a strategic fleet management company like Geotab to increase efficiency and take their fleets to new heights.
Author: Etienne Muller, Commercial Manager – GEOTAB AFRICA