Fleet Technology 2021 Trends And Predictions

By Rajesh Rudraradhya, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at Lytx Inc.

As fleets move into 2021, agility will become an important skill, for both organizations and manager-leaders. Those who can quickly adapt will win. This article presents 10 technology trends that likely will make the biggest impact on the ability of transportation, logistics, and service organizations to rapidly assess changing environments and quickly evolve their playbooks to meet new challenges.

In 2020, the world got a glimpse into the world of transportation, logistics, and service organizations – inner workings of the global infrastructure that, until the pandemic, many had taken for granted. As large swaths of the workforce went into lockdown, news coverage showed fleets stepping up to ensure steady supplies of food, medicines, and essential goods and services. Ordinary people took an interest in distribution trucks – if only to seek an edge in securing some toilet paper.

Undoubtedly, the popular interest will dissipate. But the significance of this industry will not. If anything, the events of 2020 will likely ratchet up the demands placed on this sector as never before. Consumers increasingly expect same-day fulfillment for just about everything. Companies are adjusting orders on a dime, and they want real-time updates from providers. These market forces have been developing over the years, but the shock of 2020 has accelerated the timeline and made them more urgent. Delivering on these expectations will require an evolution of the technologies that support fleets. This brings us to a question that I am now hearing a lot in my role as chief technology officer of the world’s largest video telematics company: