Melbourne-based Speedshield Technologies provides telemetry and engineering products and solutions to various industries and aftermarket applications including aviation, automotive, industrial, mining, and mobile fleet equipment. As part of its first attempt to enter the Indian market, the company made its debut at Busworld India, looking to start with the bus segment.
Mr. Richard Close, Global Business Development Manager, Speedshield Technologies, tells us: “We have developed a global product that manages and monitors the vehicle, monitors the driver/operator, helps in preventive maintenance and does many other functions. We are linked to about nine satellites around the planet and can get signal from practically any location to beam the data through GPS.”
“We are very strong in the industrial market and we think our products are very suitable for the bus market, especially in Asia. We work with a couple of bus operators in South East Asia and are quite keen to enter the Indian market.” he added.
Explaining as to why the company preferred to start with the bus segment and the response it has had at the show, Mr. Close shares: “This is our first serious attempt to enter the Indian market. We feel the bus market is globally a very safety-conscious one and while our customers initially used our products more for efficiency and cost-saving, our products contribute significantly in improving safety. We are here (at Busworld) with an open mind and want to learn and understand about the Indian market.”
“Based on our experience here, we have come across two or three types of customers – the first one who want to just track their bus; secondly, the large fleet operators who have shown serious interest in partnering with us to develop products; and lastly the bus manufacturers, one of whom even discussed with us on the possibility of factory-fitment of our products. We also had a visitor who could be a potential distributor for our products in India, but our first step would be to understand the market and come up with a product suitable for the end-users here. The distributor is important but only if we have the right product to offer.” he said.
The 23-year-old Australian firm has its own team for designing both the software and hardware also owns a production factory in China. The company considers its non-dependence on third party suppliers and its ability to customize the product according to customer needs as two major contributors to its global success.