HE wanted his father’s tragic death from a road accident ended. Hence, Salvador Silva III embarked on a project that users can apply to help them avoid meeting the same tragedy.
“It became a personal mission to me when my father died from a road accident,” Silva told the BusinessMirror in a recent interview in Makati. “For me, doing this service is to improve traffic safety.”
What Silva did was to develop a technology platform and service deployed on cloud that enable enterprise users to monitor their assets such as vehicles and personnel in real time. The Web application called SafeSat GPS (global positioning system) was designed by Silva and Filipino software engineers. For five years, they also developed the technical specifications.
Silva said he decided to develop the cloud-based SafeSat GPS system because he wanted to contribute to making Philippine roads safer. The United Nations said there are 34 deaths daily in the Philippines because of traffic accidents.
After launching the initial prototype in 2014, Silva said they proceeded to develop the second version after the production of the first version proved to be expensive because of the higher cost in Canada. They also outsourced the manufacturing process in Hong Kong, Taiwan and China.
There are two products being offered by SafeSat. The first product is for sales and distribution that can be downloaded by mobile phones. The other is a device installed in a vehicle.
“The main objective is to monitor the fleets while the mobile application will follow the movements of personnel on the field,” said Silva, CEO and president of Complete Logistics Control Inc. and Philfast Global Forwarding Inc.
Silva said SafeSat monitors aggressive driving through the a feature they call SatBox.
The device provides real-time monitoring, giving the monitoring party all the important data like speed, distance travelled, route taken, actual time of transport, and even feedback on the driving habits of the employees.
“It has become a habit of drivers to step on the gas pedal when they are rushing. The more you press hard, the more you waste fuel,” he said. As two of its distinctive features, SafeSat sensors can detect and record incidences of harsh breaking and sudden acceleration that are attributed to aggressive driving.
A repeated cycle of 16 times more than the regular three to five times per transverse is likely to qualify for aggressive driving. Aggressive driving is directly attributed to fuel wastage of up to 30 percent, a wear and tear increase in parts of more than 20 percent and, the worst part, the increased risk of figuring in accidents, Silva explained.
Silva, who has a 10-year background on logistics, said his logistics businesses achieved up to 30 percent savings on fuel consumption and up to 20 percent on maintenance cost.
“We were able to maximize our units used through efficient delivery timeline,” Silva noted.
For a 10-wheeler truck running on a six-cylinder engine, Silva said a liter of fuel that previously covered 2.1 kilometers can be made to cover 3 km with efficient driving.
Proper maintenance of the vehicle can also be monitored through the SafeSat GPS. At P30 per liter and 5,000 km traveled per month, the additional distance covered translates to as much as P21,400 in monthly fuel savings, Silva explained. He said the company is also promoting an application installed in GPS-enabled smartphones.
He pointed out that the system enables employers to track personnel or vehicle individually or in groups using the mobile phone. Further, it informs the head office the route taken by the vehicle and provides a report on the logged events of selected vehicles and personnel.