Tech Watch

Aether Systems, supplier of the MobileMax2 mobile communications system, has acquired a number of commercial trucking-oriented products from @Track Communications, including HighwayMaster Series 5000. Aether will administer the service and pay @Track to maintain the existing network. HighwayMaster Series 5000 provides voice and data communication over analog cellular networks. Aether’s MobileMax2 offers dual-mode communications using ground-based digital networks where available and a satellite-based system elsewhere.

NSI Global’s Vistar Datacom subsidiary will integrate its GlobalWave satellite communications system with Maddocks Systems’s popular TruckMate fleet management software, allowing fleets to be remotely monitored, managed, and controlled via the TM4Win software interface. Cancom Tracking, a Canadian reseller of Vistar’s GlobalWave product, has been working with both companies to make the products compatible. TM4Win provides billing entry, point-and-click dispatching, mobile communications, accounting, and management reports. GlobalWave is a two-way satellite data communications system that helps users automate tracking and monitoring of mobile or fixed assets.

Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers has launched rbauctionBid-Live, a bidding service that lets you follow the live auction, hear the auctioneer, and place bids, all live and in real-time over the company’s Web site, www.rbauction.com. The Richmond, B.C., auction house said the service gives Internet bidders the opportunity to bid against onsite customers on items in a “fair and open” environment. Internet bidders are able to “sense the mood and momentum of the auction because they are listening to the auctioneer’s call in real-time,” said Bob Armstrong, vice-president of Internet services. “And because they are participating in an unreserved Ritchie Bros. auction, they can bid knowing there is no artificial price manipulation and that the equipment they are bidding on will be sold to the highest bidder.”

PeopleNet Communications has launched its IMessaging and Start/Stop products in the first-phase implementation of PACOS, its load and driver management system. PACOS (PeopleNet Automated Circle of Service) is designed to free drivers from having to physically enter information about their trip into an onboard computer so it can be relayed to dispatch. Instead, PACOS will automatically download a manifest created by the dispatcher prior to the trip to a computer on the vehicle, and then collect information about the vehicle’s progress and location on the fly. Imessaging lets drivers and dispatch send large blocks of data, such as load assignments and routing instructions, often in one, rather than several, billable messages. Start/Stop enables event-based locating and reporting. Starts and stops are determined by combining speed, time, and ignition parameters.