Satellite Technology Feature Article
February 19, 2010
Reltima's GPS Tracking Devices Help Transporters Recover Stolen Trucks
By Narayan Bhat, TMCnet Contributor
With an increasing number of transportation companies arming their fleet with GPS tracking devices, stealing of vehicles has been increasingly difficult in California.
Woburn, Mass.-based Reltima LLC, a provider of GPS vehicle tracking and telematics systems, said it has helped many transportation companies in Compton, Calif., recover stolen trucks worth more than $300,000.00.
Officials from Western Merchandise Express, a freight transportation company based in Compton, said they used Reltima's Teluware GPS tracking system and successfully recovered 4 stolen tractor trailers from various locations in Southern California, having directed authorities to the alleged perpetrators.
All the vehicles were tracked down in a span of just one hour, Reltima said.
Using the Teluware tracking system, the police conducted surveillance at 2 locations which resulted in the arrest of several alleged participants in the crime.
The GPS devices, according to WMX Loss Prevention Director Geoff Montgomery, are small in size and they fit in any vehicle completely undetected - unlike many of the larger bulky products of the past that were easily disabled by the bad guys.
The Reltima SmartAntenna, a GPS tracking device, is about the size of a one-quarter-inch-thick credit card. If installed covertly in the vehicle cab, it feeds GPS location based data to a server over a wireless network. The Teluware fleet management application, hosted by Reltima, then translates this data into easy-to-read metrics for finding the location of vehicles.
Montgomery said his company had even used GPS application to detect how one of their drivers was selling company products for individual profit.
During a routine surveillance of a driver, Montgomery says, they discovered that an unauthorized stop had been made. As they dug deeper into the case, (using the Reltima link to Google (News - Alert) maps street view) they found out that the location was a pallet reseller.
Later it turned out that the driver was selling company pallets for individual profit.
“To our surprise a second driver had been implicated. Interviewing the drivers had never been easier, with color screen shots of the street view option and a breadcrumb trail of the driver’s whereabouts the drivers had no choice but to confess,” Montgomery said.
Narayan Bhat is a contributing editor for TMCnet. To read more of Narayan’s articles, please visit his columnist page.
Edited by Amy Tierney
