Circet: boosting safety and sustainability with fully integrated fleet insights

Challenge: A need for an innovative solution to future-proof fleet operations

Circet Ireland & UK is a leading provider to the Telecommunications, Transport Infrastructure and Power Sectors.

The company wanted to improve driver safety, reduce operating costs and improve its sustainability performance. They sought a technology partner that would be able to fully support its large fleet in addressing these challenges now, with the capability to expand with it as it grows. Geotab was chosen for its record of constant innovation and investment in product development, while also being able to provide local service delivery and support. The final deciding factor in choosing Geotab was the depth of its ecosystem integration that the entire organisation could benefit from. 

Solution: Full integration for maximum impact

Over just three months, Geotab and Circet have collaborated to connect 4,000 vehicles with Geotab telematics devices and Lytx Surfsight™ dash cams with road and driver-facing lenses in all vehicles. Geotab deployed a local project team of experts which is available onsite as required to ensure this smooth rollout, providing internal training and implementation support and ongoing innovation throughout the relationship.

Circet’s fleet consists of a diverse mix of both Internal Combustion Engines (ICE) and EV vehicles (EVs), including light and heavy commercial vehicles, and Geotab is uniquely placed for its ability to extract data from such a wide range of makes and models of vehicles. This provided Circet with 100% visibility of its fleet data, which is vital to manage such a large operation. 

Deep integration of footage and events data from Lytx Surfsight® dash cam into the Geotab fleet management platform allows a seamless unified view to create insight via the Geotab user interface and rules engine, whilst delivering video events directly into the Safety Centre for the team to analyse. 

Deep ecosystem integration

The Circet team uses GoAnalytics to simplify and enhance their fleet management processes. GoAnalytics integrates Geotab’s advanced telematics with the Lytx Surfsight dash cam and real-time analytics so they can promote safer driving behaviours, monitor driver and vehicle performance, and proactively identify risks. 

With the Geotab Data Connector, Circet has been able to fully integrate the solution with internal business systems. This has streamlined processes for the HR and accounts teams, and the integration with the PowerBI enterprise intelligence software allows senior management to extract valuable management insights and automate reporting for instant trending and long-term analysis.  

Ensuring optimal safety while protecting driver privacy 

With the solution, drivers can be alerted to any risky behaviours and given the chance to self-correct in near real time. If this doesn't happen, the operations team receives an alert so they can follow up with the driver. Any incidents or near misses are also sent directly to the operations team for analysis. This provides the driver with support in near real-time, and gives the operations team access to precise incident footage from inside the cab and on the road, together with telematics data showing exactly how the vehicle was being driven at that moment.

During the deployment of dash cams with road and driver-facing lenses, the team proactively addressed driver privacy concerns. The Lytx Conceal Service is used to blur driver images, number plates, pedestrians and other road users, helping to safeguard privacy concerns while still maintaining visibility into risky behaviours. This approach protects both driver safety and driver trust. 

Driver risk analysis complements the insights provided by the dash cameras, supporting Circet’s driver safety programme and allowing for active comparison between drivers. 

Sustainability and EV support

The operations team has been using Geotab’s Sustainability Centre to monitor and reduce fuel consumption and associated CO₂ exhaust emissions across the diesel fleet. It can also measure how transitioning to electric vehicles is reducing the fleet carbon footprint. 

Geotab's carbon footprint measurement solution utilises a TÜV Rheinland Energy & Environment GmbH-certified calculation method for Scope 1 emissions. This provides Circet with a structured, data-driven approach to tracking, measuring, and optimising its sustainability efforts.

Driving an EV in a safe and energy-efficient manner isn’t the same as for an ICE vehicle. The EV drivers required training to help them adapt, to ensure they optimised their EV energy efficiency, and therefore the range that they could achieve. Thanks to Geotab’s position as a market leader in its ability to extract full EV data, all of Circet’s Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV) and Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicle (PHEV) data can be used to provide driver feedback and training. Optimising energy efficiency not only extends the vehicle’s range, but also reduces the company’s Scope 2 emissions, while minimising the load on their charging infrastructure. This makes it a critical factor for Circet to be able to control moving forward, as they transition more of their vehicles to electric to ensure their continued compliance with EU legislation on ESG reporting and carbon emissions. 

Cost-saving potentials

By actively monitoring driver safety performance across the metrics of distracted driving, excessive speeding, seatbelt use, harsh acceleration, braking, and cornering, the team will be able to reduce its collision risk, measured as the number of possible collisions per 100,000 km. Not only will this make the drivers and other road users safer, but it will also help to reduce all the associated costs of collisions, from vehicle repair to vehicle hire, insurance, and medical costs. 

“The dashboards and reports in MyGeotab’s Safety Centre have helped us to identify the behaviours that contribute to a higher risk score. By studying trends and targeting these behaviours, we’ve been able to train our drivers to improve their performance, reducing both our safety risk and our fuel consumption. These insights will support our safety programme and help us to reduce our carbon footprint. ” – Mark McLaughlin, Group Transport Manager at Circet

Surfsight dash cam footage can now be used by the risk team in the event of incidents to provide insurers with evidence to support their claims and dispute fault with contestable collisions. This can help to bring down the cost of insurance by reducing the incidence of at-fault decisions. 

The maintenance team will utilise Geotab's maintenance centre together with active vehicle diagnostic insights. Potential faults can be detected in real-time, with notifications sent to the workshop so that they can schedule preventative maintenance before these small problems escalate. This advanced warning allows for parts to be ordered and vehicle scheduling to be planned to minimise vehicle downtime, while preventing costly breakdowns. 

Geotab’s full data support for EVs enables Circet to optimise the performance of their current EVs to extend range and reduce charging costs, and it will provide critical data insights as more of the fleet is transitioned to electric. This will also help Circet to lower their fuel and maintenance costs.

Impact: Proving the ROI potential 

In just three months since contract initiation, Geotab’s data showed that Circet was already making some impactful savings and improvements across its fleet operations, with the potential for much more to come.

Driver safety:

• Circet recorded a 15.74% improvement in their safety score over the first three months of the contract. The core safety metrics of harsh acceleration, harsh braking, and harsh cornering all improved across the fleet over these three months to contribute to the improved overall safety score.
• The average driver safety score is 42% better than the industry benchmark performance, and is close to the performance of the peer group leaders.

Increased sustainability:

• Their tailpipe emissions of CO₂ were therefore also 10% lower than the peer group leaders (24 kg/100 km).

EV fleet performance and cost savings

• As Circet transitioned fleet vehicles to electric, an average of 3% of the fleet’s total trips were being completed by BEVs over the first three months. During this period, their BEVs traveled 424,356 km.
• The average energy efficiency of their BEVs was very strong, at 20.3 kWh/100km, or 2.3L/km-e when compared to their diesel counterparts. 

Next Steps: 

The next target for Circet is to improve fuel economy and reduce the fleet carbon footprint, disclosing its carbon reduction action plan to achieve net zero emissions by 2030, so that the company can ensure it complies with the EEC’s Environmental, Social & Governance (ESG) targets and the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD). The EU’s ESG Framework aims to encourage businesses to adopt sustainable practices and increase transparency and comparability in ESG reporting. The company recognises the potential financial and reputational impacts of inaction. 

Building upon the target of improving fuel economy and reducing the fleet carbon footprint, the next steps also involve a comprehensive review of fleet safety protocols. Circet will leverage GoAnalytics and coaching metrics to conduct a deep dive into existing strategies for mobile phone usage and speeding based on the data provided by the Surfsight dash cams. This analysis will determine the effectiveness of current practices and identify areas where adjustments or changes in tactics are needed. By proactively addressing potential risks and implementing preventative measures, including driver incentive programmes, Circet aims to enhance driver safety further and minimise incidents. This will ensure both the well-being of its drivers and the overall efficiency of its operations.

From the Fleet Manager/Customer 

“We have been really impressed with the depth of the Geotab Ecosystem. We were easily able to integrate it into all areas of our business, so that our fleet data is no longer siloed, but instead is readily available for all our departments to use. This has reduced administrative time and strengthened workflows from payroll to sustainability, all the way through to senior management.” – Ray Verschoyle, Head of Transport Compliance at Circet 

*The data presented reflects the initial three-month deployment phase. We anticipate that data trends will normalise over time. As a next step, we look forward to collaborating with Circet to focus on further improvements based on ongoing data analysis and optimisation.