EP3070652A1

EP3070652A1 - Driving management system in vehicle fleet and corresponding method

Info

Publication number: EP3070652A1
Application number: EP15382120.2A
Authority: EP
Inventors: Abel Rionda Rodríguez; David Martínez Álvarez; Fernando Aparicio Martínez; Xabiel García Pañeda
Original assignee: Adn Context-Aware Mobile Solutions SL
Current assignee: Adn Context-Aware Mobile Solutions SL
Priority date: 2015-03-17
Filing date: 2015-03-17
Publication date: 2016-09-21

Abstract

The present invention relates to a driving management system in fleets of vehicles which makes it possible to perform an individualized monitoring both of the vehicles forming the fleet and of the drivers which occupy each one of the vehicles, automatically recording and managing the data both of the vehicles and of the drivers onboard, and to the associated method which establishes a set of stages to perform the optimum operation of the previous management system.

Description

OBJECT OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a driving management system in fleets of vehicles which allows performing an individualized monitoring both of the vehicles forming the fleet and of the drivers which occupy each one of the vehicles, automatically recording and managing the data both of the vehicles and of the drivers onboard.
The associated process establishes a set of stages to perform the optimum operation of the previous management system.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Driving management systems in fleets of vehicles are known in the state of the art which allow performing the driving management in a set of vehicles which form a fleet of vehicles.
These management systems are closed, since they do not make it possible to incorporate new vehicles in the fleet of vehicles to manage. Furthermore, they have drawbacks with respect to the fact of managing certain models or makes of vehicles which do not comply with established standards, or which are of a certain age.
Among the previous systems is that disclosed in patent US7715961 which describes a data mining system of fleets of vehicles for drivers, which characterizes the vehicle and the fleet. The system comprises a data acquisition subsystem onboard the vehicle through a set of sensors and a remote control centre where the data collected by the data acquisition subsystem are sent to a control system to be analysed.
Systems are also known to monitor vehicle efficiency such as that disclosed in patent US6253129 comprising an onboard device with capacity to take data from the vehicle such as speed, rpm, fuel consumption, oil pressure, tyre pressure and other data to determine the vehicle efficiency.
Neither do the previous systems allow a personalized monitoring to be performed of the driving carried out by the drivers, which means it does enable evaluating if the inefficient driving is due to the vehicle or the driver.
FMS (Fleet Management Systems) are also known implemented in vehicles which are standard developed by various manufacturers with the aim of providing an access point to third parties which can develop remote control systems independent of the vehicle manufacturer, allowing the information of the different protocols circulating through the CAN bus to be read. Since a large part of the vehicles and makes of vehicles on the market currently do not incorporate that fleet management system, which is compulsory for the EU after Euro VI, the CAN bus messages are encrypted and depend on each manufacturer.
Furthermore, the switchboards which incorporate CAN buses and which can provide information on the driving, are available from EURO III vehicles onwards. However, a high percentage of the fleets of vehicles are older so that they do not incorporate this type of switchboards, and with the systems known to date it is not possible to obtain information from them.
The present invention resolves all the previous drawbacks via a driving management system in fleets of vehicles which allows obtaining, irrespective of the vehicle and whether it has a fleet management system integrated, data so that the drivers drive more efficiently and safely in all type of vehicles and fleets, and it also allows savings to be provided in fuel costs and emissions.

DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a driving management system in fleets of vehicles comprising an onboard subsystem in at least one vehicle which collects information from at least one switchboard or ECU present in the vehicle and transmits it to a central subsystem which is optionally responsible for its storage in a database and performing the monitoring of all the vehicles in the fleet and of all the drivers of said vehicles.
Optionally the onboard subsystem further comprises a CAN data bus (Controller Area Network) which transmits the information from the switchboard or ECU to the central subsystem.
The onboard subsystem in at least one of the vehicles comprises a reading device further comprising a decoder which makes it possible to perform the reading of the information of a set of protocols associated to the operating data collected by the onboard subsystem.
The onboard subsystem in at least one vehicle comprises a reading device comprising a decoder which makes it possible to perform the reading of the information of a set of protocols associated to the operating data collected by the onboard subsystem, a set of protocols which circulate through the CAN data bus if it is present in the onboard subsystem. This decoder makes it possible to obtain a set of messages related to the management of the fleet of vehicles irrespective of whether the fleet comprises a fleet management system or not. The decoder also enables decoding messages unrelated to the fleet system, if the vehicle has them, such as messages related to air conditioning or the air conditioning load, which contribute to improving the analysis for driving efficiency.
The reading device further comprises a connector where at least one sensor from an external system is connected, which may measure air quality or noise, among other things, making it possible to integrate said information obtained by the external sensors in the onboard subsystem which, in turn, is sent to the central subsystem.
The reading device further comprises a start-stop connector which sets in motion the driving management system when the vehicle starts and stops it when the vehicle stops, with the objective of a suitable management of the energy consumed by the reading device and the possibility of notifying other external sensors or systems which start or stop its operation.
The onboard subsystem further comprises a processing and transmission module which processes the information obtained from the reading device which is later sent to the vehicle switchboard to be later transmitted to the central subsystem, and an alarm and/or recommendation message display module which gives indications to the user and/or to a manager of the vehicle or fleet of vehicles regarding the efficiency of the driving.
The driving management system in fleets of vehicles further optionally comprises an integration subsystem with third-party management systems which, among other characteristics, makes it possible to collect and manage the information from these third parties, which may be transport companies if the system is managing a fleet of vehicles belonging to a transport company.
The driving management system in fleets of vehicles further comprises a report administration and generation subsystem which obtains information from the database of the central subsystem and it will process it creating periodical reports. These reports shall be made available to drivers and fleet managers through the system Web portal.
The driving management system in fleets of vehicles further comprises a service management subsystem, where a user can enter incidents or service requests from the Web portal to process those self-generated by the system.
Optionally, the integration subsystem with third-party systems, the report administration and generation subsystem and the service management subsystem are integrated in the central subsystem.
The driving management system in fleets of vehicles of the present invention has, in short, the following advantages:

It allows scalability due to the easy incorporation and management of new vehicles and drivers in the system:
- ∘ Irrespective of the vehicle type (make and model) and their age
- ∘ Automatic generation of personalized reports and recommendations.
- ∘ Remote update (complete, including a GPS or the decoder).
- ∘ Externalized installation (Discovery and automatic recording of the onboard equipment).
It allows individualized monitoring per driver, being possible to measure the result of the learning and establish recognition policies within the company. Monitoring of groups for comparison (vehicles, drivers or complete fleet) bearing in mind the contextual information.
It considers operating and management information of the company to provide efficiency indicators which assist them in decision making in planning routes and lines (e.g. if a certain route is more efficient with a model of vehicle or with the journey variation proposed by the system the consumption is more efficient). It also incorporates other adjustments to improve this process.
It allows the incorporation and management of other environmental systems (e.g. measuring the air quality in movement):
- ∘ It facilitates the management of these systems: It starts and stops with the effective movement of the vehicle
- ∘ It enriches the information these systems require for their analysis:
  - it provides the instantaneous speed of the vehicle, together with the GPS and marking of time.
It incorporates multidimension in the analysis applied to large groups of vehicles that are not directly related (multifleet).
It incorporates contextualization with the road.
It provides indicators of efficient driving and road safety.

The invention also relates to a driving management method in fleets of vehicles comprising the following stages:

a collection stage of the vehicle operating data by at least one switchboard or ECU present in the vehicle;
a transmission stage of the data collected by the switchboard from an onboard subsystem in the vehicle to a central subsystem;
a decoding stage to perform the information reading of a set of protocols associated to the operating data collected by the onboard subsystem.

Optionally, the driving management method in fleets of vehicles further comprises

a processing and transmission stage of the information of the set of protocols already decoded, and
a recommendation message display stage which gives indications to the user and/or to a manager of the vehicle or fleet of vehicles regarding the efficiency of the driving.
where the recommendation message display stage, which gives indications to the user and/or to a manager of the vehicle or fleet of vehicles, regarding the efficiency of the driving can be carried out in real time or in situ during the driving, or after the driving or offline.

Furthermore, the method may comprise an inefficiency pattern detection stage between the processing and transmission stage of the information of the set of protocols already decoded and the recommendation message display stage which gives indications to the user and/or to a manager of the vehicle or fleet of vehicles regarding the efficiency of the driving.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Figure 1 shows a diagram of the driving management system in fleets of vehicles of the present invention where it shows the onboard subsystem and the central subsystem.
Figure 2 shows a diagram of the driving management system in fleets of vehicles of the present invention where it shows the subsystems of the onboard subsystem and the central subsystem.

PREFERRED EMBODIMENT OF THE INVENTION

A detailed description will be given below of the driving management system in fleets of vehicles of the present invention.
The driving management system in fleets of vehicles comprises an onboard subsystem (1) in each one of the vehicles forming a fleet of vehicles which collects information from at least one switchboard (2) or ECU present in the vehicle and transmits it through a CAN data bus (3) to a central subsystem (4) which is responsible for its storage in a database (5) and of performing the monitoring of all the vehicles of the fleet and of all the drivers (21) of said vehicles.
The onboard subsystem (1) in each one of the vehicles comprises a reading device (6) which interacts with the CAN data bus (3) of the vehicle wherethrough the vehicle operating data are transmitted from the different switchboards (2), such as speed, revolutions, load level of the engine, consumption, etc. The reading device (6) is connected to the CAN data bus (3) as passive element, only performing reading and translation of the transiting messages.
The reading device (6) comprises a decoder (7) which makes it possible to perform the reading of the information of a set of protocols which circulate through the CAN data bus (3).
The reading device (6) further comprises a set of connectors and an analogue-to-digital signal converter which allows processing the values obtained from the analogue signals as values of digital signals, for those vehicles older than EURO III and which do not incorporate CAN buses (3) in their switchboards (2). Preferably, the analogue signals are from a connector which measures the rpm of the vehicle and/or of the fuel capacity. In this way, the signals already converted into digital are processed by the system as if they were from a vehicle with CAN buses (3) in their switchboard (2).
The reading device (6) further comprises a connector where at least one sensor of an external system is connected, which can measure the air quality or noise, among other things, making it possible to integrate said information obtained by the external sensors in the onboard subsystem which, in turn, is sent to the central subsystem.
The reading device (6) further comprises a start-stop connector which sets in motion the driving management system when the vehicle starts and stops it when the vehicle stops, with the objective of a suitable management of the energy consumed by the reading device and the possibility of notifying other external sensors or systems which start or stop its operation.
The onboard subsystem (1) further comprises a processing and transmission module (8) which processes the information obtained from the reading device which is then sent to the vehicle (2) switchboard to later be transmitted to the central subsystem, and an alarm and/or recommendation message display module (9) which gives indications to the user and/or to a manager of the vehicle or fleet of vehicles regarding the efficiency of the driving.
The central subsystem (4) further comprises one or several of the following subsystems:

An integration subsystem (10) with third-party management systems which, among other characteristics, makes it possible to collect and manage the information from these third parties, which may be transport companies if the system is managing a fleet of vehicles belonging to a transport company.

The integration subsystem (10) is prepared to integrate information from/towards third-party systems and use it in favour of achieving a more accurate analysis. The architecture is prepared to be neutral in this aspect, enabling integrating sources of knowledge of third parties and in turn exporting new information towards these systems. The third-party systems include:

∘ Information systems of the company (13): Many transport companies have OAS systems (Operation Aid Systems) to regulate and control traffic, logistics and shift management. The information that the system of the present invention obtains from these information systems is:
1. i. Granularity in driver shifts (21): The client's OAS could provide driver shift information (21) associated to specific journeys:
  - Vehicle ID, Driver ID (21), Date/ Start time, Date/End time, ID_line, ID_route
  - Vehicle ID, Driver ID (21), Date/ Start time, Date/End time, ID_line, ID_route
  making the system of the present invention more efficient.
∘ Environmental monitoring systems (14): The information collected through the system of the present invention from the environmental monitoring systems could be sent to an external system for its processing.
∘ Contextual information systems (15):
1. i. Coordinate adjustment and information service on the road where the vehicles are travelling: The lack of accuracy of the GPS signal of the equipment incorporated in the vehicles, means that there are erroneous positions located on buildings or ambiguities in the areas of crossroads. The solution is to incorporate a module which corrects the latitude and longitude positions (map-matching) and a second module which translates said corrected positions into the nominal value of the street (reverse-geocoding).
2. ii. Weather information service: Payment or open services which provide this information.

A report administration and generation subsystem (11) which obtains information from the database of the central subsystem and it will process it creating periodical reports (23, 24, 25). These reports (23, 24, 25) shall be made available to drivers (21), fleet managers (20) and experts or trainers (22) through a Web portal of the system. This report administration and generation subsystem makes it possible to obtain efficiency and safety indicators per driver (21), vehicle, groups of vehicles/drivers (21) and routes. It initially uses information from the vehicle, context (traffic, road) and information from the transport company. The data continuously collected in the vehicle are added, analysed and compared in accordance with various criteria, from the information from the external systems to obtain indicators and recommendations. In this way, analyses and recommendations of the following type can be made:
- Vehicle X is more efficient on the outbound route of line 12 than vehicle Y
- Driver Z has a worse driving performance in the route which travels along the street Avda. de la Costa.
- The traffic in Calle Menéndez Pelayo between 8:00 am and 10:00 am is very dense, negatively affecting driving, for which reason it will be eliminated from the drivers' monthly evaluation.
- There is a typical risk behaviour in drivers at kilometre point 162 of the A6, direction Madrid.
- Driver Z has a more efficient driving performance in vehicles of make T, in line 13.
- The use of air conditioning represents 7% of the consumption in this period, for which reason it is eliminated in the results of the drivers for that period.
A service management subsystem (12), where a user can enter, from the Web portal, incidents or service requests to process those self-generated by the system. The service management system allows performing the service management enabling mechanisms for incident management and simplifying the installation and maintenance process of the equipment for better system scalability. This subsystem makes it possible to perform the following tasks:
- ∘ Discovery and automatic recording of the onboard systems when installed (This process simplifies the installation process since it is flexible, not previously assigning equipment to vehicles and being recovered in the event of unforeseen circumstances: equipment failure, change of vehicle, installation order other than that expected), such as, for example:
  - ▪ An apparatus z is installed in a vehicle X. Apparatus z only knows the address of the central system
  - ▪ Once installed, apparatus z asks the central system indicating the vehicle in which it is installed (preloaded in the central system). The central system records the assignation and sends the onboard equipment the personalized configuration for that vehicle.
- ∘ Automatic incident detection: There are processes in the central system which periodically interrogate the different onboard systems, detecting types of incidents and autonomously operating according to the preloaded characterization of the client fleet, such as, for example:
  - ▪ An apparatus z has not sent information since 48h ago: In the case of a fleet of ambulances this lack of information may be normal (e.g. ICU vehicle stopped without activity) but in another type of vehicle (e.g. EMT (municipal buses)) this implies a possible failure of the onboard equipment or that the vehicle has broken down. This situation may involve checking the situation with the client.
  - ▪ In the analysis of apparatus z it is detected that there is no GPS information, with the remaining components operating normally.
- ∘ Remote updating of onboard equipment: The different software components of the onboard system (decoder, central subsystem, GPS,...) are prepared to be remotely updated, with it being possible to perform selective or mass updates depending on the case, minimizing the call-outs to the client's fleet.

EXAMPLE

Installation of the onboard subsystem (45 min per vehicle)

Black box phase: During this stage the drivers (21) are monitored without their knowledge - to obtain a baseline of consumption and driving habits. This phase usually lasts two months.
Assistant phase: activation of report administration and generation subsystem (11).

Claims

Driving management system in fleets of vehicles comprising an onboard subsystem (1) in at least one of the vehicles forming a fleet of vehicles which collects vehicle operating data from at least one switchboard (2) or ECU present in the vehicle and transmits it to a central subsystem (4) characterized in that the onboard subsystem (1) in at least one of the vehicles comprises a reading device (6) further comprising a decoder (7) which makes it possible to perform the reading of the information of a set of protocols associated to the operating data collected by the onboard subsystem (1).
Driving management system in fleets of vehicles according to claim 1, wherein the onboard subsystem further comprises a CAN data bus (3) which transmits the information from the switchboard (2) or ECU to the central subsystem (4).
Driving management system in fleets of vehicles according to claim 1 wherein the reading device (6) comprises a set of connectors and an analogue-to-digital signal converter to process the values obtained from analogue signals as values of digital signals.
Driving management system in fleets of vehicles according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the reading device (6) further comprises a connector where at least one sensor of an external system is connected, to integrate said information obtained by the external sensors in the onboard subsystem which, in turn, is sent to the central subsystem.
Driving management system in fleets of vehicles according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the reading device (6) further comprises a start-stop connector which sets in motion the driving management system when the vehicle starts and stops it when the vehicle stops.
Driving management system in fleets of vehicles according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the onboard subsystem (1) further comprises a processing and transmission module (8) which processes the information obtained from the reading device which is later sent to the switchboard of the vehicle (2) to later be transmitted to the central subsystem, and an alarm and/or recommendation message display module (9) which gives indications to the user and/or to a manager of the vehicle or fleet of vehicles regarding the efficiency of the driving.
Driving management system in fleets of vehicles according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the central subsystem (4) further comprises:
• an integration subsystem (10) with third-party systems to collect and manage the information of these third parties.
Driving management system in fleets of vehicles according to claim 7, wherein the third-party systems which are integrated by the integration subsystem (10) are one or several of the following:
∘ information systems of a company (13).

∘ environmental monitoring systems (14).

∘ contextual information systems (15).
Driving management system in fleets of vehicles according to claim 8, wherein one or two of the following are found among the contextual information systems (15):
i. A coordinate adjustment and information system on the road where the vehicles are travelling.

ii. A weather information system.
Driving management system in fleets of vehicles according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the central subsystem (4) further comprises:
• A report administration and generation subsystem (11) which obtains information from a database (5) of the central subsystem (4) and it processes it creating periodical reports (23, 24, 25).
Driving management system in fleets of vehicles according to any of the preceding claims, wherein the central subsystem (4) further comprises:
• A service management subsystem (12), where a user can enter, from a Web portal, incidents or service requests to process a set of incidents self-generated by the system.
Driving management method in fleets of vehicles which is performed with the system of any of the preceding claims and comprising:
• a collection stage of the vehicle operating data by at least one switchboard (2) or ECU present in the vehicle;

• a transmission stage of the data collected by the switchboard (2) from an onboard subsystem (1) in the vehicle to a central subsystem (4); further comprising:

• a decoding stage to perform the information reading of a set of protocols associated to the operating data collected by the onboard subsystem (1).
Driving management method in fleets of vehicles according to claim 12, additionally comprising:
• a processing and transmission stage of the information of the set of protocols already decoded, and

• a recommendation message display stage which gives indications to the user and/or to a manager of the vehicle or fleet of vehicles regarding the efficiency of the driving.
Driving management method in fleets of vehicles according to claim 13, comprising an inefficiency pattern detection stage among the processing and transmission stage of the information of the set of protocols already decoded and the recommendation message display stage which gives indications to the user and/or to a manager of the vehicle or fleet of vehicles regarding the efficiency of the driving.
Driving management method in fleets of vehicles according to any of claims 13 or 14, wherein the recommendation message display stage which gives indications to the user and/or to a manager of the vehicle or fleet of vehicles regarding the efficiency of the driving is carried out in real time during the driving or after the driving.