Video safety systems continue to be among the fastest growing technologies across the trucking industry.
While there are a growing number of companies in this space, Lytx is the largest player with more than 500,000 total subscriptions from commercial and government fleets. The company’s DriveCam safety systems provide video monitoring for fleets of 20 or more vehicles. Newer offerings include ActiveVision, which helps fleets detect and address distracted and drowsy driving. Frost & Sullivan estimated Lytx’s market share at over 60%.
Lytx was bought by private investment firm GCTR in 2016 and has since secured hundreds of millions of dollars in additional capital from other private equity firms.
“This investment comes at a critical phase in the evolution of data and video telematics and is perfectly timed with the next wave of machine vision and artificial intelligence services for fleets,” Brandon Nixon, Lytx chairman and CEO, said.
Lytx is based in San Diego, as is SmartDrive, which was founded in 2004 and has seen a nearly 400% growth in subscriptions over the last three years.
Frost & Sullivan estimated that SmartDrive’s video telematics system is installed in over 120,000 vehicles.
In April, Penske Logistics announced the introduction of a video-based safety program using SmartDrive for over 2,800 of its heavy-duty trucks across North America. Jason Herr, Penske’s vice president of safety, said a pilot program last year saw significant reductions in total incidents and improved safety scores for drivers at all of its locations.
A growing number of companies are entering this space as well, including several that made their initial mark in the communications and telematics space. For example, in 2016 PeopleNet introduced its Video Intelligence Solution, which brought forward-facing camera technology and PeopleNet’s Onboard Event Recording into an integrated system.
Since then, it has rapidly rolled out more features, including a trailer backup camera, which the company said is the industry’s first wireless backup camera to pair with tractors to stream live video in the cab.
Omnitracs’ Critical Event Video is another tool that allows companies to capture high-quality video that can be reviewed within a minute of the triggered event.
San Diego-based Netradyne offers a video-based safety platform that combines onboard cameras with artificial intelligence to provide what it said is a more complete view of driver performance.
Safety Vision is another company that offers video services for commercial fleets as well as a range of other industries.
About the Author
Neil Abt
Neil Abt is a former FleetOwner editor who wrote for the publication from 2017 to 2020. He was editorial director from 2018 to 2020.