Frederico Menegatti, Getrak CEO, with the GetrakFox device

10/01/2019

Getrak expects to reach 700,000 connected devices under its management by the end of 2019. The company, which works with automotive telemetry, currently has a base of 450,000 connected vehicles. One of the company’s main bets is GetrakFox, a vehicle tracking solution connected to WND Brazil’s SigFox network. With a little more than two months of operation, GetrakFox has 2 thousand clients all over the country. By the end of the year, Frederico Menegatti, Getrak’s CEO, expects the SigFox-based solution to reach 150,000 vehicles. The executive also explained that the product was developed over 18 months before being launched.

“We were looking for something specific to our market. It is very atypical and we couldn’t find it. Internet of Things networks were created, but they didn’t have a (vehicle tracking) device in the market. So we created it,” said Menegatti, in conversation with Mobile Time. “The GetrakFox started being created a year and a half ago. We started integrating the device with our artificial intelligence software (DeepTrack) that we have at Getrak to analyze and predict thefts and robberies.”

Asked about the reason for using SigFox and not other IoT networks, such as LoRA and NB-IoT, he said he used WND’s network because it was the “only commercial” one in Brazil and that he could work with “low cost, low power consumption, and in a network that was cheaper and with a reasonable coverage” (70% of the cities with more than 200 thousand inhabitants). However, the CEO hopes to talk to other operators when other commercial IoT networks are launched.

Without presenting financial data, Menegatti said that 2018 was “prosperous” for his firm. With a 65% growth in revenue, 20% in partner volume – there are 700 in all -, an increase in the vehicle base of close to 30%, and the connected equipment business grew by 200%.

In addition to GetrakFox, the company has other devices on 2G, 3G, and 4G. The 2G equipment accounts for most of Getrak’s connections and should reach 550,000 vehicles by the end of the year. Remember, the company works only in the B2B model.

Baptism of fire

Recently, the GetrakFox application was put to the test. A user had his car stolen in Pernambuco. The Toyota Corolla has two trackers, one 2G and the other on the SigFox network. The thieves managed to turn off the 2G equipment, but not the GetrakFox. As a result, the security team was called and managed to recover the vehicle and avoid a R$60,000 loss to its owner.

“The criminals stole the vehicle, were able to identify the 2G device, but could not identify the SigFox,” said Menegatti. “The user can call or use an app to trigger one of our partners to recover the vehicle. In this case, the recovery of the car was done by Vale Car.

The expectations with the equipment do not stop there. The product is being piloted in Argentina, Mexico, Colombia, as well as in two countries in Europe. In addition, GetrakFox may gain versions for other industries: “We developed this first version, but we have a roadmap of investments of R$ 5 million in 24 months. We want to develop more, take it to other segments, and analyze other IoT networks that are coming. We have demand for buckets, autonomous units (refrigerators, TVs, bank bags), which need to be tracked. These are demands brought by our partners. It fits in the palm of your hand, but we want to shrink it to the size of a keychain.

DeepTrack

Menegatti talked about another of the company’s bets: the artificial intelligence platform DeepTrack. Used to analyze and predict vehicle thefts and robberies, he explains that the software performs massive data analysis, capable of generating between 70 to 100 alerts of possible thefts per day.

“The AI platform is at 150 billion records. It does a massive process of information. That is, it understands autonomously how a vehicle is being stolen or stolen,” he revealed. “Today, almost 80% of the alerts are false. We want to get to 20%. In the robbery (of Pernambuco), for example, the customer warned beforehand. Even so, DeepTrack generated the alert when 2G was turned off.”